


Snow White & Rose Red

by em_gnat



Category: Snow White and the Huntsman, The Huntsman (Movies), The Huntsman: Winter's War
Genre: F/F, F/M, Gen, Unofficial Sequel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-22
Updated: 2020-05-26
Packaged: 2021-03-03 02:41:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 11
Words: 29,161
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24327442
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/em_gnat/pseuds/em_gnat
Summary: The mirror is shattered and Ravenna is defeated at last--or is she?Prophesy has a price, one that Queen Snow White knows all too well.
Comments: 3
Kudos: 4





	1. Chapter 1

_**Once upon a time** **,** in a lush land to the south, a princess with hair as black as a raven’s wing and skin as white as snow was born. She was named Snow White, and her life was filled with sorrow._

_Orphaned as a child, Snow White came of age locked in a tower dungeon, the prisoner of an Evil Queen and her monstrous mirror._

_But the Evil Queen’ s reign was destined to last only as long as Snow White remained imprisoned. When she finally escaped, Snow White rallied the people and overthrew the Evil Queen ._

_At last, Snow White ruled as the true queen, beloved by all-- but even in death, the Evil Queen's will to dominate lived on._

_Her mirror remained, whispering malevolently to any who dared too near. Unable to destroy it, Snow White sent the mirror to the safety of the fairy forest called Sanctuary, knowing that only good magic equal to its evil could contain it._

_On its journey, the mirror was intercepted by Freya, the tyrant of the north, who intended to use the mirror for her own ends. In the ensuing battle, the cursed artifact was shattered and the tyrant deposed. With that, all considered the last remnant of the Evil Queen destroyed once and for all._

_But with her mirror broken, was the world truly free from the influence of the Evil Queen ?_

_For_ prophesy _has a price, one that Queen Snow White knows all too well..._

  
  
  
  


* * *

  
  
  


**_Grey_ **mist drifted between the pines, painting the world in a palette of watery tones and muted browns. From far-off came the call of a mourning dove-- from upwind, the telltale snap of something large and menacing lumbering through the undergrowth. 

Hilde took a whiff of the breeze and the stench of a dark-forest bear stung her nostrils. _Worse than the stench of a he-dwarf_ , she would’ve said to her young ward, if her young ward had been there beside her. 

Blinking up into the trees, she picked out the familiar shape of long-limbed Rose crouched amidst the tree branches, a silhouette that blended in with the patchwork of shadow and light overhead. 

Hilde echoed back the call of the mourning dove-- _all ready_ \-- and gripped the trip-wire tight in her fist.

Wait... _wait_ …the crunch of the brush and branches drew closer and closer until at last, at the bend in the trail, the beast appeared. 

Its pelt as dark as sink-mud and its massive shoulders hunched, the bear moved with its head low to the ground, its nose training left and right as it walked. Burs and brambles peppered the coarse fur and green lichen discolored the fur on its left side.

The villagers had promised a big one and damn if this wasn’t the biggest dark-forest bear Hilde had ever seen. It was a marvel that it was even here. Dark-forest bears weren’t known to stray from the forest after which they took their name. 

And just as she was contemplating this marvel, the first snare caught.

The bear brayed in agitation as the slipknot tightened and one thick back leg twisted right, sweeping the left leg out from under it. The leaves in the trees trembled as it slammed down on its side, raking the soil with its massive black talons.

Hilde yanked hard on the rope she held and a weighted net dropped from above, enveloping the thrashing beast in a web of stones and twine.

With a roar, the dwarf-woman threw off the cloak of leaves she wore and pounded toward the beast, the bear-spear glinting in her hands. 

The bear whipped toward her, yellowed fangs snapping at her through the net. Dancing back, she whistled out sharp and high. From the brush at the right darted Minx, the short-legged orange and white dog yapping and snapping at the bear’s other side. This close, the stench of the creature was overwhelming, but there was nary a moment to gag. Hilde jabbed in hard from the front, aiming for the neck. With uncanny speed, the beast twisted and shrugged the net to the side. It lurched forward, its tiny eyes fixed furiously on her, and snapped at the spear. 

Wood splintered. A fracture spidered up the spear shaft.

Snarling, Minx launched at the bear's ear and latched on.

“Rose!” Hilde cried, battling for her spear. “Rose, _now_!”

With a cry and the glint of iron, young Rose plunged straight downward, falling with all her weight on the sturdy bear spear. She landed directly atop the thrashing animal. As the iron tip of the spear tore its heart, the beast threw back its head and gave a thundering death-cry. 

_The perfect opening._ Hilde shoved the spear into its throat. 

The bear shuddered and crashed to the ground, motionless.

“ ’Bout time you showed up, lass! “ Hilde straightened, flicking the long tail of her dark brown hair back over her shoulder.

“It kept moving, and I couldn’t line up the drop right.” Rose retorted. “Besides, I hate being up there. You know that.”

“You’re heavier than I am and I’m closer to the ground. The better to stay out of the way.” 

“Well, you almost didn’t stay out of the way this time.”

“I’m getting too old for this,” Hilde muttered.

Rose hopped off the beast’s back and scooped Minx up into her arms.

At 18 years of age, the girl was tall and broad-shouldered. Like Hilde, she was fortified in the fruits of their trade: bear-leather from head to toe. She wore a well-used blue gambeson, heavy plated boots and bracers, and a sleeveless coat lined in bear fur. But unlike Hilde, who had her dark hair shaped into a horse’s tail, the human girl wore her hair braided and pinned in a coil on the back of her head so that all of her hair was pulled well away from her forehead and neck. It was the same color as the orange in Minx’s coat.

Holding the little dog aloft, Rose declared, “And who do we have to thank for our victory? Why yes, it’s the fiercest of all bear- hunters! Your best student and true protege: Minx!” 

In Rose’s arms, Minx gave an agitated yap and wriggled wildly. Dutifully, Rose set her down, but with a frown.

“What’s gotten into you?” She asked, as Minx continued to growl, attention fixed on the dead bear.

“Enough.” Though Hilde’s voice was sharp and she shook her head, Rose saw her smirk. “Get the knives and the cart. We’ve taken care of our end of the deal. Now those villagers own us some coin.”

“Yes, ma’am!” Rose grinned and reached to tug the spear from the bear’s carcass. Her fingers only slightly grazed the shaft, when the bear’s corpse suddenly moved. 

“Watch out!” It was the only warning Hilde had time to give before a massive paw swiped at the air where Rose had been. The girl was a blur, tumbling end over end across the clearing

 _But this was impossible!_ With both its heart and jugular pierced, that bear should have been far past dead.

Hilde and Minx both launched themselves forward, the dog for the creature's ear and the dwarf-woman for the spear shaft that still protruded from the bear’s neck. Hilde gripped the spear, shoving hard into the beast’s flesh. To her amazement, the bear twisted, gripped the spear in its jaws and snapped the shaft.

Desperately drawing her hunting knife, Hilde dove out of the way..

From a pouch on her bandolier she scooped a handful of glass-dust and threw it into the bear’s face. Then, she drove the hunting knife into its eye.

The bear screamed, a sound so filled with pain and rage that it did not sound like the cry of a bear as she knew it. In all her years of bear hunting, from all the corners of the realm, she had never fought a bear that made a sound like that.

It whipped its head, flinging Minx in a great arc, and Rose leaped up to catch the terrier before she struck the ground. The impact sent the girl tumbling backward, her body curled protectively around Minx, as the bear stood up to its full towering height. The knife still stuck out from its eye. Rose’s spear was still in its back, and hot fluid steamed from its neck, leaving clouds seaming on the morning air. The heavy net hung from it as if it weighed nothing. 

“Look out!” Rose shouted. 

The beast lurched forward but the snare on its back leg still held. It came crashing down, right where Hilde had been standing. There it lay, a low, haunting groan issuing from its mouth as a black tongue lolled out. Black fluid, the consistency of ink, slowly spread around it, pooling under its head. Rivulets of the same fluid ran out of its wide-staring eyes.

For a moment, the only sound was Hilde’s wheezing breaths. She doubled over, rubbing the place on her forearm where one of the bear's claws had torn off her bracer and slashed her skin. It wasn’t a deep cut, thanks to the ruined bracer and gambeson….but it shouldn't have been able to cut so deep. It shouldn’t have been able to snap the spear.

It also shouldn’t have been able to live past a spear through its heart and throat.

Rose walked carefully forward, holding Minx in her arms. The dog whimpered softly, plaintively as they peered at the ink-soaked soil.

“What in the nine-hells was that thing?” Hilde whispered.

* * *

The dwarf-woman and the red-haired human girl rattled into the village square. They came with a short-legged orange and white herding dog and a cart covered with a tarp. They had no donkey, so the girl pulled the little wagon using hand rails that jutted from the front. The dwarf-woman and the dog walked alongside, the dwarf with a large oil-cloth sack slung over her back.

Shutters rattled as citizens peered cautiously out of windows. Then a cry went up from the watchtower:

“The bear-hunters have returned!”

A bell rang out, tinny and frantic. The square was suddenly over-run with the overjoyed denizens of the village. At the front came a silver-haired older man, his beard sculpted into a point. Rose recognized him as the mayor, the man who had hired them to hunt this particular bear. He was neatly dressed, but not well-dressed. None of them were, really. It wasn’t a wealthy village but the bounty was only a small part of their earnings. The bear’s carcass was worth its weight in silver. That is...it _would have been_ , if they’d been able to _keep_ it.

“My friends, _my friends_ , you’ve returned! And so soon!” The mayor held his arms out to them as if they were old friends coming for a visit.

Rose dropped the handholds of the cart and crossed her arms over her chest.

“Did you expect us back at all?” she grumbled. 

Clearly hearing her, his smile faltered but then he recovered and fixed his gaze squarely on Auntie Hilde.

“You’ve killed it, haven't you?” he asked, his smile suddenly looking more like a grimace.

In front of her, Auntie Hilde planted her feet and dropped the sack between them. The cloth fell open and the bear’s great head rolled out, black ink still dripped from its opened mouth.

The crowd let out a collective gasp and shrank back. A baby wailed.

Then the mayor's blue eyes swelled wide. 

He crowed out in victory, “The beast is dead!”

He punched the air with his fist, and the crowd followed suit. People were clasping shoulders and embracing in relief.

Auntie Hilde spat, hooking her hands into her belt.

“Now we’ll be talking about renegotiating that price,” she said, rocking back on her heels.

“Pardon?” The mayor was mid-laugh. “Oh yes, the payment.” He fumbled for the purse at his hip

“Not enough,” Auntie snapped, tugging the pouch from his grip.

“The agreed upon price--”

“That was before we killed the thing,” Auntie said, narrowing her dark eyes at the man. “You left out some pretty important information when you hired us to kill your bear, huh?”

“I beg your pardon, ma’am--”

“Oh leave off with ‘ma’am’!” Auntie was fuming, and the villagers were slowly starting to realize that an argument was building. 

The mayor straightened his chicken-thin neck, Adam's-apple bobbing as he swallowed. “You are bear-trappers, aren’t you? You said bear hunting was your trade. Now, we agreed upon a price--”

“We’re not sure that was a bear,” Rose interrupted. Minx barked in agreement.

Rose stepped around to the side of the wagon and threw off the oilcloth tarp. Amid their belongings lay the few things they were able to take form the creature in the woods. But first, Rose pulled out Auntie’s broken spear.

“Bears don’t _break_ bear spears.” Rose raised her voice, holding the spear aloft. “That’s what they’re made for--killing bears!” She tossed the spear back into the cart and pulled out a glass jar filled to the brim with swirling black fluid “And bears don’t bleed blood this color.”. 

Next, she pulled out the bear’s pelt. She unfurled it across the dirt at their feet, revealing the raw skinned underside streaked with black ink. 

“And bears,” she huffed, straightening up. “Don’t have insides all black like tar, that comes spilling out when you try to skin them.”

“The carcass was supposed to be part of our payment,” Auntie Hilde said, low and dangerous, yanking the mayor’s attention back to her. “You just wanted the head as proof, but the rest you said we could have. That’s our trade. But we couldn’t get anything out of that thing. When we cut it open, it was rotten inside, like nothing I’ve ever seen. That wasn't any kind of bear _I’ve_ ever hunted.”

“You set us up,” Rose said, her face fixed in an unforgiving scowl. “You hired us to kill that bear, and then you didn’t tell us everything about it. What else are you keeping from us?”

A guarded look was exchanged. As the silence stretched, Hilde huffed under her breath.

“Out with it!” She bellowed at last, causing the mayor to flinch. Minx’s bark punctuated her cry. 

The mayor bowed his head. “You’ve been out in the woods a while, I take it.” the mayor said in defeated tones. There were circles under his eyes from lack of sleep, and his shoulders slumped. He looked as if he’d aged a decade in the span of a breath.

A pretty-faced young woman with dark brown skin stepped in front of the mayor suddenly. There was a falcon-like sharpness to her nose and she wore a vermilion scarf wrapped about her head in a tight turban. Rose had noticed her before the hunt, when they had negotiated with the mayor. 

The young woman hadn’t said anything then. Now she said, “My name is Sirai. If you follow me, I’ll show you something you need to see.”

For a moment, the mayor glared in furious silence at the young woman, his eyes screaming at her to stop. Sirai pointedly ignored the look that was meant to stop her. 

Instead, she turned and strode away.

Rose hesitated, glancing questioningly toward Auntie Hilde.

Hilde gave a shrug and turned to follow the young woman. 

“Minx, guard the cart,” Rose said, and raced after them.

Behind them the mayor turned to the crowd and held up his arms. “The beast is dead! This calls for a celebration!” 

Shouts and cheers rang out, but the further away from the crowd they walked, the more muted the sounds of celebration became. 

Sirai led them to the low stone wall that separated the village orchard from the road that ran along the south side of the village. Reaching onto her belt, she drew a small knife--only 3 inches in length. Rose’s hand went to her hunting knife, and then froze. She watched as Sirai picked an apple from the tree overhead and cut it open.

“Look,” Sirai said softly, holding it out for them to see.

Black ichor dripped from the apple, splashing two perfect ink blots onto the soil at their feet.

“Just like the bear.” Rose whispered.

Sirai nodded. “My uncle thinks that with the bear dead, our orchards will return to normal.”

“Your uncle?” asked Rose.

“The mayor. Mayor Brennic.”

Auntie Hilde snorted. “You look as much like his niece as Rose looks like mine.”

“My mother and father were both taken away during the reign of the Evil Queen. My father was forced to join the Evil Queen’s army. My mother was taken to the castle. Neither one of them came back.”

Immediately, Rose’s own upbringing came to mind. She could sympathize with Sirai and wanted her to know it, but now wasn’t the right time to commiserate over missing parents. 

The pause after Sirai’s confession ended up stretching for a breath too long. 

“You said your uncle thinks the village will be cured now that the bear is dead,” Rose said, at last, more than a little awkwardly. “But you think otherwise, don’t you?” 

Again, Sirai nodded. “I do.”

“And what do you intend to do about it?” Auntie Hilde arched one dark brow, not without a little bit of mockery.

“If this is the beginnings of a blight, then the queen must hear of it,” Sirai said. “I’ve been trying to convince my uncle to let me travel south to seek an audience with her. If anyone can stop this blight before it goes too far, she can.”

“Ah yes, _Snow White_. Hair as black as a raven’s wing, skin as white as snow. She sounds very pretty.” Auntie rolled her eyes.

Rose couldn't help but snicker. “But she’s supposed to be some kind of lady knight too, right?”

“ _And_ she talks to fairy-creatures. And I’m sure she has a lovely singing voice, too!”

“ _Queen_ Snow White,” Sirai interrupted with a flare of irritation. “Is a healer.” The apple rolled across her palm and dropped to the ground with a loud thump. 

Rose, trained to read the body language of bears, could see in the tension of the young woman’s spine and the way she held her head upright and rigid, that she was not just annoyed--she was _insulted._

For _whom?_ , Rose wanted to know. For _Queen Snow White_ , some lady out of a bed-time story who none of them would ever get within a hundred paces of, let alone meet? 

Furious as Sirai held herself, she put the little paring knife away.

“She has the blessed-touch,” Sirai continued, schooling calm into her voice and features. “If there’s evil creeping into her land, then she can counter it. But she can’t do that unless we warn her.”

 _“We?”_ Auntie Hilde scoffed, taking a pinch to tobacco from one of the half-dozen pouches on her bandolier and tucked it into her cheek .

“You want us to do _what_ , exactly?” Rose turned toward Sirai with equal exasperation.

Sirai, caught under two sets of disapproving stares--one from the red-haired tom-boy and and other from the surly she-dwarf-- blinked in surprise. “You fought the beast, didn’t you?” she said. “You saw that it had sickened, that it was soured inside by something. And you have the trophies; the head, the pelt, the blood--”

“Yeah,” Rose asked, uncertainly. ”What of it?”

“We’re bear-hunters, lass. We hunt _bears_. We’re not mercenaries for hire, no matter what you’ve heard about dwarves. And people like the two of us--” Here, Auntie jabbed her thumb at Rose and then indicated herself with a pound of her fist on her chest. “--don’t get invited to audiences with the queen! Now if you’re feeling adventurous, go on your way! Seek your audience! Save the land! But my niece and I have work to do, and you and your damned village have cost us enough time and money.”

Auntie Hilde hooked her thumbs into her thick leather belt, and thrusting her bosom out, said “We’ll be on our way now. Rose!” She snapped her fingers as she turned. 

For a moment, Rose looked at Sirai. She still held herself perfectly upright and still, with an expression of quiet resolve. Her eyes met Rose’s for an instant. After getting such a dressing-down from Auntie Hilde, Rose felt sorry for her. She’d rarely been on the receiving end of Hilde’s temper, and pitied anyone who ended up there.

Rose gave an apologetic shrug, muttering a perfunctory, “I’m sorry” then followed after Auntie Hilde.

“And before we go,” Auntie turned back, hands still on her hips. “I’ll still be wanting that extra pay!” She spit the tobacco out in a masticated blob, wiped her mouth on her sleeve.

“Auntie, are you certain we shouldn’t go along with her?” Rose whispered, only loud enough for Hilde to hear. “I mean--what if she’s right?”

“Lass, we’re so far out of our normal fare with these people. _Bears._ Bears are what I know. Whatever that thing in the woods was, it wasn't a bear, not anymore. And that means it's none of our affair.”

“Right,“ Rose nodded, but her face was twisted up in an unconvinced scowl, wrinkling the old scars that curved up her right cheek. “But still--”

Rose didn’t have a chance to finish what she was about to say. 

Auntie Hilde gave a growl of pain and doubled over, clutching her arm to her chest. 

“Auntie, what is it? What--” Rose bent close to her as Hilde’s breath hissed between the gaps in her teeth. Rose seized her arm and yanked it away from her body, enough to clearly see the problem. After the battle with the bear, Auntie Hilde had wrapped clean bandages around her forearm. Now, those bandages were soaked through with blotches of ink-black. 

“Damn it,” Hilde growled, slumping into Rose’s arms. 

“Help,” Rose’s voice cracked. She tried again, louder this time, her voice piercing the air like a cavalry horn. “Help! There’s something wrong with my aunt!”


	2. Chapter 2

**_Sunlight_ ** glinted off waves and dazzled across the stone walls of the castle. Salt-scented breeze rippled through the pennants that adorned the battlements: deep sea-blue cloth on which the outline of a white tree, its boughs spreading victoriously upward, had been lovingly stitched. 

Snow White, queen of her realm, stood on her bedroom balcony, overlooking the coastline where the green hills met the sea. Her black hair hung loose and a simple royal circlet rested on her brow. Her heart was full. It was as if the sunlight itself warmed her spirit.

Then, something on the far-away waves flashed. Another glint of the sun off the waters. But-- _no_.

The bright flash of light came again, closer this time. A bird winged its way toward her, and as she stood there, it landed neatly on the stone balustrade next to her hand. It was a large raven, its feathers shining gold. 

The raven sidled closer, bowing its head under her palm. Her fingertips grazed its smooth, gleaming beak…

_Snow White-_

The golden raven whispered her name in a voice she knew, a voice she recognized, a voice she thought she would never hear again…

“Snow?”

With a jerk of her head, Snow White spun around. Turning, she saw William, King-consort-- _her William_ \-- standing on the threshold, his fine dark green cape fixed with a leaf-shaped pin. It was his finest cape, not the well-worn cloak he used when traveling incognito on her behalf.

“The counsel of lords is already in the hall and the petitioners have begun to file in,” William’s voice trailed off. He peered at her, his eyes warm and quizzical. He stepped forward and took her hand in his. “Are you alright, my love?”

She was not used to the way he said that so easily.

Snow White looked back toward the railing, but there was no bird perched there, nothing but the ocean waves in warm sunlight stretching out to the horizon.

Had she _imagined_ it?

She became aware of William standing close, searching her face with an expression of muted concern. She gave his fingers a reassuring squeeze.

“I’m fine,” she said, leaving him no choice but to believe her. 

* * *

“The hall of Queen Snow White welcomes Sir Tull, First of the Seven Wardens of Vardhelm!” The crier’s voice sang out over the hall, drawing gazes toward the throne. 

Snow White sat in a simple, off-the-shoulder gown of red velvet, the sleeves and bodice stitched with the pattern of white leaves. The queen was not known for her height, so a small footstool propped up her feet. The tips of two plain satin slippers peeped out from beneath the hem of her skirt. She wore only two adornments; a gold marriage band on her left ring finger and a circlet studded with deep crimson garnets. Her black hair fell loose around her shoulders. To those who ventured close to the dias, the young queen staring down at them in this simple gown with her uncoiffed hair, seemed both infinitely young and infinitely old, her eyes filled with quiet compassion.

The man who stepped forward to greet her had a solemn face and a broad nose and his hair was cropped close to his head. He wore a charcoal suede coat lined with sable fur, darker than the deep brown of his skin, and belted over well-made but utilitarian looking riding leathers. He, like Snow, was dressed well but not so ostentatiously that his clothing outshone his countenance.

“I am Tull, your majesty. I’m pleased to meet you,” said Sir Tull, with an efficient bow. 

“The kingdom of Vardhelm has decided to elect a tribunal to govern them?” Snow White recognized the whisperer in the crowd. It came from close by, from the cluster of well-known lords who reported for the different holdings of her kingdom.

Councillor Reinholden snorted. “A tribunal? Made up of whom?”

“Commoners,” Lord Hillock replied, covering the word with a cough.

“My understanding is that they were _elected._ “

“Sir Tull,” Snow White raised her voice slightly, and the lords snapped to attention like a troop of naughty squires. "May I ask you what your profession was before you became First Warden?”

“I was a _huntsman_ , your majesty,” He said _your majesty_ as though he was trying to remind himself who she was. “One of Queen Freya’s elite guards.”

“I knew a _huntsman_ ,” Snow White said warmly, ignoring the displeased scowl of Lord Reinholden.

Sir Tull returned her smile with one of his own. “If you crossed paths with a _huntsman_ and lived, then you are just as formidable as they say.”

“He was a dear friend.”

Beside her, William cleared his throat, a sign to move on.

Snow White leaned back in her chair, arranging her hands neatly in her lap. 

“I’ve heard much of what happened in the north but I look forward to speaking with you more later, Sir Tull. I would very much like your personal account of what transpired with the Ice Queen.”

“I look forward to speaking with you, your majesty,” he said, then stepped aside for the next petitioner. 

The crier banged his brass staff on the flagstones and the sound resonated to vaulted ceilings of the throne room. The soft whisper of conversation that had started up moments before faded once more, as the crier announced the next petitioner.

Snow White found her attention stolen by the play of sunlight through the stained glass windows, panes cut to look like they housed a forest of emerald green trees. It was a beautiful effect, one that reminded her, achingly of the Sanctuary forest. 

She thought she heard the distant cackle of a crow, and something glimmering fluttered in front of the stained glass windows.

_A golden raven?_

Gently, a hand touched her arm. 

Snow white blinked, coming to attention. William was looking at her, his patient expression a little strained. 

“Duchess Mordiern from Tallrock Keep,” William whispered.

Drawing a deep breath, she turned back to her audience and welcomed the duchess with a smile. 

* * *

Freshly recessed from the days' petitioners, Queen Snow White at last strode down the great corridor, flanked only by her personal attendants, King-consort William and Duke Hammond, her father-in-law. Hands knotted together in her red velvet skirts, Snow White walked briskly, her entourage charging to keep up with her. She always walked briskly, and the joke among the castle staff was that she had years of walking, running and jogging to make up for--having been imprisoned for ten long years.

Heels clicked on tiles, echoing across the walls, and amid the sound of their steps, Duke Hammond continued to speak.

“Now we have the granary guild to receive and their books to audit. They are only here to report their seasonal planting so we know what to expect during the reaping season. And tonight, your majesty, there is the official feast for the Vardhelm delegation--Your majesty, if you don’t mind my saying, you seem very distracted today.”

William tried to interject. “Father--”

“If you will permit me to finish, _King-consort_?”

The use of his title stung like a reprimand. William fell silent but the muscles of his jaw worked as his teeth ground down a series of unspoken words.

“I do not mean to patronize you, my dear. You’ve always been know to comport yourself with grace and tact-- the best attributes of both your father and your mother. But I am worried now that Ravenna is gone and her mirror destroyed--”

Snow White stopped in her tracks, and swept a steely gaze toward the older gentleman. He wore the weather damaged face of a man who has seen many battles, and as her father-in-law she liked him, but the look she leveled at him was that of a queen to her subject. 

“We would do well not to utter the _Evil Queen’_ s name so casually in conversation,” Snow White said. “Names have power.”

“Pardon me, your majesty,” the Duke ducked his head in apology. “I mean no disrespect, only to speak a piece that has long been on my mind. The lords are concerned, particularly with what has happened in the White Lands. The Queen there being replaced by a tribunal of elected officials….they worry that if a strong hand is not show, that perhaps here--”

“Father, that’s ridiculous. We had 10 years of a particular kind of strong hand, and look what that did to us! The people love Snow White,” William’s voice shot out of him like a hiss of steam. “And this land is her birthright. She is the only one who can captain it. Everyone can see how the land prospers now that she is at the helm.”

“Ship metaphors were never your strong suit, son.” The Duke huffed disapprovingly. “Best leave them aside.”

“I am only saying--”

“Please,” Snow White held up one hand, her pale fingers slicing the air as she brought it up between them. “This is not the time nor the place to have a family argument.”

The two men fell silent. The Duke tugged on his collar uncomfortably, and William fiddled with the silver leaf pin on his cape. Behind them, their entourage tried their best to school their features into neutral masks.

“Duke Hammond,” Snow White addressed her father-in-law formally. “Should I be concerned about my lords?”

“Ah,” his mouth worked as he briefly _hmm_ -ed and _ahh_ -ed his way through a series of possible answers. “No, your majesty. Your lords love you, just as your people do. I do not mean to sound as if I am sowing discontent.”

“Even so,” Snow White said. “Perhaps I should speak with each of them alone. I wish to hear what is in their hearts, and they’ll be more honest if they don't have to vie for my attention.”

The Duke nodded.

“As you say, your majesty. Notate that in the queen’s itinerary. We will have to make plans…”

As the Duke began to speak, Snow White’s gaze strayed down the hall. Her lips parted as if she meant to speak, but then she simply walked away.

Startled by her departure, father and son exchanged a meaningful glance.

“She hasn’t been the same,” William said softly. “Since the mirror was destroyed.”

* * *

Alone in her spacious rooms once more, Snow pressed the door closed with both hands. For a moment, she stood there, holding the world out. Slowly, she removed the circlet from her head. Her pale face reflected back at her from the depths of the large decorative garnets. She sighed deeply and moved across the airy room. Curtains gently ruffed in the breeze.

Carefully, Snow White laid the circle into the velvet lined jewelry case meant to hold it. All along its sides, trees inlaid in ivory shimmered. The branches reminded her of the horns of the great white stag of the Sanctuary forest. When she closed her eyes, she could still see the forest, smell air thick with the perfume of a thousand different blossoms. Her heart had never felt so light as it had when she was there. Though she loved her duty, and loved the shine of the sea as it greeted her every morning, Snow White longed for that forest. 

A shadow passed before her closed eyes and for an instant she heard the beating of bird's wings.

She spun to face the open balcony.

The silhouette of a slender woman stood there, framed against the sky. Gold sunlight shone around her in a sparkling aureole. There was something familiar about how she wore her hair, the way she stood, that resonated in the young queen’s thoughts, prickling at her memory.

_“My beautiful Snow White…”_

She was certain she knew that voice.

Snow reached toward the light, eyes shining in wonder.

Her fingertips brushed shoulders and a fall of soft hair as the figure reached to embrace her in turn. The woman’s face drew close to her own until they gazed at one another, nose to nose. What Snow White saw, as if reflected back to her from the surface of a mirror, was her own face.


	3. Chapter 3

**_Rose_ ** had never seen her aunt _that_ color before, the color of wax dribbling down the side of a candle. Hilde’s skin was clammy to the touch. Her head moved from side to side and from her lips came disjointed mumbles, as if she thought she could argue her fever down.

Rose glanced down beside the bed and Minx lifted her shaggy brows at her, giving a soft whimper of concern. 

“It’s alright, girl,” Rose whispered, trying to ignore Auntie Hilde’s unbandaged arm, laying motionless atop the rough blanket. The shallow claw marks that had been no real cause for concern when Auntie had cleaned and wrapped them were now dark slashes against her skin, and veins of grey spread out from them, like the roots of a weed.

Both she and Rose had taken their knocks before. Rose wore three long scratches down her right cheek from a red bear they’d trapped two years ago, when Rose had just turned 16. Today, Auntie Hilde had been more concerned about the torn buckles on the bracer than she had about the marks the dark-forest bear had left on her flesh.

But that bear hadn’t been normal, and that meant the wound wasn’t normal.

Just outside the door, Sirai engaged in a passionate discussion with the village healer and Mayor Brennic. The pitch of their voices rose and fell, punctuated by half-shouted words. 

It went on and on until Rose had had enough.

She shoved the chair back from the bedside with a screech and marched for the door. 

“Stay!” she said firmly to Minx when the dog stood to join her.

Rose flung open the door, startling all three of the arguers at once.

“Are any of you going to share with me what you’re talking about?” Rose fumed. “Or am I just supposed to sit in there like a mute until you’ve decided to let me in on the secret?”

The healer, an old woman with red henna tattoos on her forehead and skin the leathery tan of someone who spent a lot of time in the sun, tucked her knobby hands into her apron pockets. She shot a sullen glance at Mayor Brennic but the man had only cleared his throat. Rose was just remembering that her hunting knife was right there on her belt when Sirai stepped forward to distract her.

“Our healer says you aunt is too ill to be moved,” Sirai said, her eyes flashing from one town elder to the other. “But you are not allowed to stay.”

“Too ill to be moved,” Rose echoed, incredulously. “But we’re not allowed to stay? Well then, what _exactly_ do you intend for us to do?” 

“We have the rest of the fee you asked for. Three times the agreed upon price,” Mayor Brennic shoved a jingling pouch at Rose, his voice sharp one moment, tremulous the next. 

“And what am I supposed to do with that?” Rose cried. “She got injured by that stupid bear because of you. And now that she’s sickened, you’re going to send us on our way. Do you think that money makes your hands clean?”

“Take the coin, girlie,” the old healer-woman whispered.

Rose rounded on her. “My name isn’t _girlie_ ,” she said furiously but snatched the purse of coins from the mayor’s hand anyway.

On the other side of the door, Minx began to whine. Rose’s attention split for a moment and in the instant she was distracted, the mayor turned and fled.

“Hey!” She called, but the healer and Sirai were already bundling her back into the cottage. "Don’t push me!” 

“I admire your fire,” the old healer said, jabbing a crooked finger in her face. “But you need to learn that not everyone you come across is a bear in need of poking. Now, Sirai, the poultices--”

The pair of them began to flit around the room, pulling jars from cabinets and small envelopes from drawers. Rose recognized apothecary herbs being tied up into little bushels, and the women packed all of it into a satchel. 

“What about the traveling packs?”

“I’ll put them in the wagon, but we need to move her out onto it first, and tuck her in. And we need to do that before your uncle realizes what we’re about.”

“Thank you, Elfina.”

“What is going on?” The fury in Rose’s voice stopped the women in her tracks. They blinked at her, their expressions perfectly placid, and Rose felt red-faced and out of place. On the bed, Auntie Hilde muttered.

“Do you remember what we talked about in the orchard?” Sirai asked.

Rose’s brows pinched together in a scowl. “Yeah.”

“Well,” Sirai said, hooking the satchel around her shoulder and straightening up. “I guess you have cause to come along now.”

“Excuse me?”

“You’ll travel south with me,” Sirai said, lifting her chin. “We’ll take your aunt to the castle with all your trophies from the hunt. Queen Snow White will certainly see us, especially with your aunt in the state she’s in. Both our goals are achieved.”

Rose’s lip curled in a sneer. Her hand fell on the hilt of the hunting knife. “Or I could just hold you hostage. Make you take care of us here.”

“You might be able to fight a bear, but I think you’ll find thirty men and women with staves a sight more difficult to handle by yourself,” the healer said. “Now, don’t be a fool. I’ve given Sirai here enough tinctures and poultices to keep your aunt’s fever down while you travel. You’ll need to keep your eye on that arm. If it spreads, you might need to tourniquet it at the elbow and cut it off.” The old woman squinted a pale grey eye at Auntie Hilde. “But even that might not save her. This is not a natural malady. Your best hope is the Queen.”

Rose sucked in a deep breath, weighing her options. Slowly, her hand dropped away from the hilt of her knife.

“It doesn’t seem like I have much of a choice,” she said at last. 

“You do,” Sirai said. “But neither choice is very good.”

“Alright then,” Rose huffed, clapping her hands together. “Then let’s get her out of here.”

Both of them grabbed a side of the pallet that Auntie Hilde lay on, Sirai holding the right side of the bed while Rose dashed around to grab the other side. At the count of three, they hefted her up, and shuffled toward the door, Auntie swaying between them as if she was merely napping on a hammock. 

“Minx, move,” Rose muttered, as the little dog nervously bounded around their feet.

Elfina grabbed the door and they shuffled outside. The cart with all Auntie and Rose’s gear was just around the side of the cottage. Together they hefted her inside, snuggled between the sacks and baskets. 

“Rose….Rosie my lass, there’s something--” Auntie’s voice was rasping, delirious from fever. “Have to tell you...if I die from this damned wound…”

“Better to sit her up at a slight angle,” Sirai said.

“Hand me that bedroll there, on your left.”

Rose held out her hand, and Sirai shoved the bedroll into it. Rose stuffed it under Hilde’s head and shoulders, propping her up. Auntie Hilde was still trying to tell her something. All the while, Minx whined and scratched at the cart.

“Alright. You can come up. Come on,” Rose acquiesced, and the dog leapt up onto the cart, laying her head across Auntie Hilde’s knees. 

Elfina came around, with a small vial that she uncorked.

“For the road,” the old healer said, and tipped the contents into Auntie Hilde’s mouth.

Hilde sputtered, grimacing and she coughed. “I’m already dying,” she said with a particular clarity to her voice. “No need to help me along.”

“That,” Elfina sniffed imperiously. “Will help bring down the fever. And help you sleep.”

“I don’t need to sleep right now. Lass-” She grabbed Rose’s wrist so hard that Rose was certain she’d leave a bruise. “Lass, I need to tell you something about your _father_.”

Surprised laughter bubbled up out of Rose. What she knew about her father wouldn’t even fill a thimble. He was a nobody; a one night tavern-tumble her mother had had when spirits were high. Then nine months later-- _oops_ , it’s a girl. 

“Auntie, I think you’re delirious,” Rose muttered.

“I’m not, and I’m trying to tell you something--”

“I think it’s about time you get going,” Elfina said. Taking Sirai by the shoulders, the old healer gave her a firm kiss on each of her cheeks. “Now be off with you. I’ll make your excuses to your uncle. And stay on the road!”

“I will,” Sirai assured her.

“I mean it,” Elfina’s voice was sharp. “Don’t stray.”

In the cart, Auntie Hilde gave a loud, long snore. Carefully, Rose pried Auntie’s fingers from her sleeve and laid her arm at her side. She reached across and scratched Minx between the ears. For a moment the sad-eyed little dog’s gaze met her eyes, then she gave a very canine sign. Rose forced her mouth into the vague shape of a smile, though she didn’t really know who she was doing it for. She wasn’t fooling the dog, obviously, and she certainly wasn’t fooling herself.

_What if we don’t get to the castle in time. What if Queen Snow White can’t even help us? Will Auntie just...just..._

Straightening, she took her position at the front of the cart between the hand-rails. She paid Elfina a nod as both thank you and farewell and they rattled away. Rose ducked her head, trying to push the tears back into her eyes. It was foolish to cry now.

“Are you alright?” Sirai asked, carefully sidling up beside her. 

“I’m fine,” Rose sniffed. Setting her jaw, she turned her gaze ahead, down the road and to the south.

 _You had better save her_ , she directed her thoughts toward the beautiful black-haired savior-Queen, miles away and ignorant of their struggle.

And she thought-- just for a moment--that she heard a voice whisper back.


	4. Chapter 4

**_“We_ ** have no idea where the queen has gone, your majesty,” the bedchamber maids said in unison, glancing to one another and then to King William with faces caught between confusion and concern. 

“We came here to prepare her wardrobe for the reception banquet tonight, with notes from the chamberlain on proper cut of the dress…”

William strode in ahead of them, the older girl still explaining, as William did a quick but ultimately ineffectual circuit of the room. What did he hope to gain by glancing into the wardrobe or peering behind the curtains? They weren’t children anymore, and it wasn't as if he expected her to pop out from beneath the bed and shout _surprise!_

Fists on his hips, he turned to look at them, and noticed Snow’s dressing table. Her garnet-studded circlet sat dutifully in its jewelry box. 

So, she’d come back here after they’d parted ways, left the crown...then gone out again?

“If you see the queen,” he said. “Send a runner for myself or Duke Hammond immediately.”

The two maids curtsied in unison. “Yes, your majesty,” they said. 

William was already rushing out the door. 

_Snow, now is not the time for games,_ he silently fumed, aware that every moment the hands on the clocks inched closer to the time when the banquet would commence.

She _had_ been more and more distracted lately, more and more far away in her manner and gaze. There was no warmth from her, no...William stopped, interrupting the tumult of his own thoughts. 

No time for games.

He had a hunch, but it was mad. Why would she be there, after all this time? Yet the thought pulled at him.

Knights and squires bowed to him as he raced across the courtyard, dust caking his fine boots. The afternoon sun slanted long over the wheat fields, and the farmers were even now finishing their days. Women bundled up sheaves and hefted them into baskets carried on their backs. William slashed through the fields, his breath coming fast, bits of stalk and grain sticking to his fine dinner-coat. 

The trees were dead ahead. Breathless, he charged under the towering oak tree, peering up into its branches.

“Snow.”

Standing on one of the sturdy boughs overhead, still in her red and white gown from this morning, was the queen. She was barefoot and she had hitched her skirts up like a country girl to better climb. She stopped climbing at the sound of his voice and turned to glance down at him, her face obscured behind the fall of her hair. 

“What are you doing?” he huffed, just getting his breath under control. 

“Remember when we used to climb this tree, Will?” she called down to him, a smile echoing in her voice. 

“Yes. Yes, I remember,” William said in confusion. “Snow, you didn’t tell anyone where you were going. We’re all getting ready for the reception banquet.”

“Oh, yes. _That,_ ” she sounded more than a little disappointed. 

“Well, come on,” he gestured back toward the castle, now a silhouette rimmed with golden light of the setting sun. 

He watched as she reluctantly sidled down from her vantage point until she was on the branch just above him. She strode out along the branch until she stood over him, her bare legs peppered with tiny scratches from running through the fields barefoot and without stockings. 

“Where are your shoes?” he asked. Instead of answering, she leaped down. He flinched, putting out his arms to catch her too late. She landed on her feet next to him, laughing at the way his face had blanched in surprise.

“Don’t do that!” He gasped. “What if you broke your ankle?”

“From a little fall from a tree? I don’t have bones made of glass, you know.” She smiled, straightening the flower wreath she wore atop her head. She must have woven it herself. It suited her, but it was a little askew. He was caught between her beauty, her charm, and the oddness of her behavior. 

Reaching up to straighten the wreath, he noticed something sticking out of Snow’s dark hair. He gently took hold of it, and drew it out.

_A raven’s feather._

“Where did this come from?”

Snow laughed, shrugging her shoulders. 

“And you never said where your shoes have gone.”

She cast her glance around. “I must have lost them.”

“You _lost_ them?” 

“Will, do we _really_ have to go back?” Snow White said wistfully, looking toward the darkening eastern horizon, already deep purple and sparking with a dozen diamond white pinpricks of light. “Can’t we stay here until the stars come out? Like we used to, when we were children?”

And there it was--another pang of warning, but William didn’t know why. He tossed the raven’s feather to the ground. “We’ll be late at this rate. You still have to change--”

“Oh, never mind all that,” Snow said. “I’ll race you back!” 

Then she was off, running ahead of him, her laughter trailing behind her as she ran. William called after her. When she didn’t stop or slow, he gathered himself and ran dutifully after her.

Just as he had when they were children.

* * *

Torches flickered across the courtyard, and though carriages were arriving, and servants bustled around, opening up carriage doors and ushering lords and ladies inside the dining hall, the Queen and King were nowhere to be found.

“Where in God’s name is he?” Duke Hammond muttered, stomping back inside.

In the warmly lit, wreath-festooned hall, a string-quartet played a bright tune. At the long tables, set up to entertain multiple guests, conversation was lively. The guests walked freely between tables, goblets in hand, trading conversation. 

The Duke smiled and nodded at a lord that shot a glance his way, but he knew from experience that his expression was not very convincing. He had been told, more times than once, that his face was too frank and his mouth had a pinch that belied the carefree way he wandered through the gathering with his arms folded behind his back.

“It’s getting a little late to begin supper, isn’t it Hammond?” 

Damn it, he hadn’t noticed Lord Reinholden stalking up behind him. “Will the Queen and her consort be joining us?”

“What’s the matter, Reinholden? Is the atmosphere too pleasant for your liking? Are you in a hurry to rush back to your dreary holdings and brood by the fire?” He grinned at Reinholden with what he hoped was enough tooth to silence the man. 

“I always thought you a shrewd man, Reinholden. Being so near to troll lands, you’ve always been known to have the grit for battle. I wonder what you will do with that fighting spirit now that there is no Evil Queen to throw your forces against.”

“I was there at that sham of a battle, when Magnus ‘rescued’ her,” Reinholden stood up straight, his jaw clenched in outrage at the memory. 

“And I was here at the castle when she murdered him. We all have our mistakes to atone for,” Hammond said.

“No one is more loyal to the crown than I,” Reinholden’s nostrils flared and the whites around his eyes grew large, making him look like a furious battle charger. His hand went to his belt, where his sword should have been, but no one in the hall wore their weapons tonight. 

“Damn it, Reinholden, put your sword away.” Hammond said, heat rising in his face, equal to that of the Troll Fens lord. 

He wheeled and gripped the man by his arm. For a moment, their furious gazes met and they were both younger men. Reinholden had been a boyhood friend of Magnus’s, just as Hammond had been. There was bitterness there still, not as deep-buried as either of them wanted to believe. 

Hammond gentled his grip. “Magnus’s daughter is your queen at last. Be grateful for that.”

The lively music faltered and Hammond became aware of a disturbance by the door. Both he and Reinholden turned in tandem to see Snow White and William enter.

They both looked as if they’ve just rolled down a hill. The queen’s hair was tangled, and her dress--the same dress she’d worn earlier in the day-- was scandalously tucked into her belt. As Hammond watched, his mouth open in wordless disapproval, William reached over and helped her untie her skirts, so that they fell over her dirty shins and feet. 

She was barefoot.

William, in the attire Hammond was aware his son's servants had selected, was damp with sweat, as if he’d run a long distance, and his hair was rumpled and unkempt. He saw blades of yellow grass on Williams boots, along with the dirt that he trod off onto the freshly cleaned floor.

Hammond, once flushed with fury, now felt all the color bleed from his face. He watched in horror as the queen walked about, greeting her guests, and every one of them tried not to show their confusion. For his part, William at least looked embarrassed, but that was no consolation to Hammond. He wanted to march over, grab the pair of them by the ears like errant children, and shake them. 

“Queen Snow White and King William have arrived,” the crier announced. “Lords and ladies, please take your seats!”

Feeling Lord Reinholden’s gaze burning into him, Hammond turned and made for the Queen's table, pointedly looking at no one but his son.

The twelve lords of her High Council seated around her, Queen Snow White sat down in her place of authority, looking warmly around the table. Hammond sat in his chair, beside his son. 

“Where was she?” Hammond growled, leaning into his son’s shoulder. 

William refused to look at him. “Father, we will speak about this later.”

“The pair of you look ridiculous.”

“ _I said_ , we will speak about it later.”

“Where is the delegate from Vardhelm?” Snow White said suddenly, her voice sharp and bright over the sound of tinkling cutlery. Lines of servants entered the hall, some carrying silver trays while others pushed small food-laden carts.

“Sir Tull is at that table _there_ , your majesty,” Hammond said, nodding. 

“That won't do,” Snow White said. “I promised him we would speak tonight. I want to hear his story. We’ve all heard the tales, but here we have a witness to the whole plot. I would very much like to speak with him.” She did not look at the Duke as she spoke but seemed to be craning to look past her own lord's heads like an overeager child.

“Your majesty,” Hammond said carefully. “After the meal there will be time for dance and discussion.”

“I would like to speak with him now,” She said, waving her hand at him. “Bring him over to sit with us.”

“Your majesty,” that was Lord Reinholden’s voice, stiff and brimming with anger. “This table is for the lords of your High Council. There is no space here for a representative of a neighboring kingdom.”

The Queen turned to him and fixed him with a quiet, steady gaze. For a long moment, the pair locked eyes. Slowly, Snow White smiled. 

“How kind of you, Lord Reinholden, to offer up your seat to our guest. You have my most sincere thanks.”

Her words echoed in a hall that had gone almost entirely silent. Guests from other tables had stopped their conversations to listen. Lord Reinholden glanced to his left and right in disbelief but the other lords said nothing in his defense, only stared at him with mute horror. 

The sound of his chair scraping back as he stood up shuddered up Hammond’s spine. 

Reinholden loudly cleared his voice.

“Sir Tull, I believe this belongs to you,” he said. Without another word, he turned and marched from the hall. No one else left in protest but the loss of Lord Reinholden was keenly felt--by all except the Queen, it seemed.

“Please, First Warden, we would be overjoyed to dine with you this evening,” she called.

For a moment, the First Warden of Vardhelm frowned in confusion. The queen beckoned him with her hand.

He rose and crossed to the Queen’s table. For the feast, he was neatly attired in a formal black suit with the North Star symbol of Vardhelm stitched into the front of his tabard in pale blue thread. He seated himself in Lord Reinholden’s vacant chair. As soon as he had come to rest, the room sprung back to life. Hammond suddenly had his attention stolen by a servant who was offering him a choice of two plates.

“Sir Tull, if you wouldn’t mind regaling me with your story. It sounds quite exciting.”’

“I don’t know if exciting is the word I would use for it, your majesty,” Sir Tull said.

“Then choose another word,” she replied, smiling.

“Harrowing.”

“And yet you survived, and you’re here.” 

“Yes, your majesty.”

“One thing I wonder about,” Snow White said, picking up her steak knife. “Is what became of the mirror.”

Neatly, she began cutting into the small cooked quail neatly trussed up on her dinner plate. Her eyes, as the knife moved, were on Sir Tull.

“It was broken, your majesty. Shattered into a thousand pieces.”

“Shattered--” Snow White gasped, and the knife clattered from her hand. 

“Snow--” William murmured, quickly retrieving an embroidered dinner napkin and pressing it to her hand. 

“It’s just a little thing,” the queen insisted, but when William pulled the cloth away to look, the blood that prickled the queen’s palm looked black. Hammond blinked, and then the blood was red again. Rose red, just as it should be.

“It’s alright, see? No harm done.” The queen turned her hand to show the place where the cut had once been. The flesh had already closed, leaving nothing but smooth pale flesh behind. Lord Hillock laughed as if it were a party trick.

William quietly called over a servant and handed the bloodied napkin off to him. Yet when Hammond looked at it, there on the white cloth, staining the fine embroidery of the royal house’s familiar crest, were three black droplets.

* * *

Reinholden marched out into the torch-lit courtyard, shoulders back and fists clenched at his sides. He was keenly aware that he was alone. For all their posturing, and vows of loyalty, Lord Talisen and Lord Brodovan had not followed. Even now, they were sitting at the Queen’s table, likely putting on brave faces and saying nothing as to the slight Reinholden had just been dealt. And _Hammond_ \--Hammond had just sat there looking like a doe-eyed fool.

What would Magnus have thought of _this?_

Pride drove his feet to the stable. At that moment, he wanted nothing more than to saddle his horse and ride break-neck all the way back to the Troll Fens. There, at least, he would not be humiliated before the court by some slip of a girl not even twenty years old. 

“Sir, can I help you?” Asked a young groom beside the door. One look at Reinholden’s furious face was enough to send the boy away. He did not follow Reinholden into the stable or ask if he needed further assistance. To tell the truth--Reinholden would not have asked him for any. 

Lord Reinholden, lord of Troll Fens, had spent a decade under the Evil Queen’s rule. Too poor to keep a single servant, he’d tilled his fields alongside the peasants so that his small holding would not starve. He could very well saddle his own damned mount.

When he entered the chiaroscuro lighting of the stable, he paused at what he thought was the sound of birds' wings. Glanced up, he expected to see a barn owl alighting on the support beams overhead but in the lantern light, what he saw was the glittering backside of a crow.

He strode down the aisle, the hay strewn floor whispering as he walked. Something odd in the stillness--the silence--threw him off. 

Then there came the softest sound of a footfall behind him.

Reinholden whirled around, hand flying to the place on his belt where his sword would have been. Of course, there was nothing there. He had given up his sword upon entering the dining hall, as was customary, and in his fury he had walked out without getting it back.

Even so, he would not have needed it at that moment. There was no unknown assailant bearing down on him. The one who stood behind him was the queen.

“Your majesty,” he said, tense with confusion.

She had tidied herself up a bit since he’d stormed out of the hall. Her hair was now freshly combed beneath her circlet of office, and it might have been his imagination, but he did not remember her having been dressed in that particular gown: full-sleeved, and trimmed in black. Her pale skin seemed almost to glow in the poor lighting.

“You were not intending on leaving, were you Lord Reinholden?”

“I felt, your majesty, that I had been thoroughly dismissed. If I am no longer needed here, I would like to return to my holdings. The sooner the better.”

She tilted her head, almost imperceptibly, and in the dark her eyes seemed to glitter.

“Your queen still needs you,” she said.

“My queen,” he said between gritted teeth. “I do not think that is the case.”

“You served my father as one of his lords for years unfaltering, did you not?”

“Yes, your majesty.”

“But you will not serve me.” 

There was something in her voice, a shrewdness that he had never seen her show. It was as if she was looking into him, through him, into his innermost thoughts-- thoughts he had never shared with anyone. He didn't realize she had moved closer until she was directly under him, peering up into his face. “You do not love me, as you loved him.”

“You are my sovereign, your majesty,” he threw the words out defensively, falling back a step.

“But you loved him.” Her hands came up and cupped his face, trapping him in place. Though the gesture seemed kind, tender almost, Reinholden had the frightening thought that he could not have extracted himself from her grasp even if he tried. “I, too, know what it’s like to yearn for something that seems to always be just out of reach.”

He heard a whirlwind of wings overhead and felt the wind stir through his hair. He looked up and then his vision went dark, vanishing in the surge of a thousand raven wings.


	5. Chapter 5

_**In** her nightmare, a woman in a red dress stood ankle-deep in gleaming dark water. In her hands, she held an apple blossom branch in full bloom. When she snapped it in half, the sound was like a breaking bone. Black blood poured out of the splintered edges, dripping onto the red dress, soaking it, until her red gown was a gleaming black mass of fabric and viscera… _

Rose started awake, her chest tight as if she’d been running in her sleep. For a moment, her heart kept on thundering. 

“Was it a bad dream?” a voice asked quietly. “You’ve been tossing and turning all night.”

Overhead, the sky was just turning that shade of pink that indicated the sun was on the ascent. 

Rose twisted onto her side to find that Sirai had already stored away her sleeping roll and built a morning fire. Dressed in her traveling skirt and belted, full-sleeved tunic, Sirai looked fresh-faced and well rested in the flickering light of the breakfast fire, and she studied Rose from the other side of the tea kettle as she poured out a cup of something aromatically steaming.

Sitting up in the cart, bright eyed and smirking as she gnawed on a sausage link, was Auntie Hilde.

“Well, _I_ had a great night’s sleep,” Hilde said, clear-voiced and alert. “Don’t know what’s troubling you, my lass. You normally aren’t so precious about where you sleep. What was it, the crickets screaming all night? Were you sleeping on a pebble?”

Rose grunted in irritation and dragged herself miserably out of her bedroll, shaking the clinging folds of fabric off her foot. Grimacing, she bundled her bedroll in one quick motion, and fished around in the cart for her day clothes.

“Our friend here said she slept like a baby. Didn’t you, Sirai?” Auntie Hilde continued on teasingly as Sirai approached with the proffered cup. This close, Rose could smell what was being offered: a steaming cup of nettle tea.

In answer, Sirai simply handed Hilde the cup.

Auntie took one whiff of it and gagged. “I’m not drinking that,” she snorted.

“It’s good for the constitution and if anyone needs a good constitution right now, it’s you,” Sirai said, sniffing imperiously. Auntie Hilde continued to eye the cup dubiously. “If you don’t drink it, I shall take it _very_ personally.”

“And we wouldn’t want that,” Rose grumbled, reaching over. “Bottoms up,” she said, then tipped the cup of steaming liquid up against her aunt’s mouth.

“Hey now--” Auntie Hilde’s protest was cut off by gargling and swearing. “Hot! It’s hot!”

“Fine,” Rose said. “But you’d better drink it all.”

Fixing on her belt, Rose stalked back over to the breakfast fire. She shoved a fist full of brown bread in her mouth, barely chewing it as she set to work briskly breaking down their little camp. There wasn’t much to put away and her bad mood moved her along.

“Are you usually a morning person?” Sirai asked, coming over to help her. She gazed at Rose with a calm clarity that irritated her. 

“Clearly, _one_ of us is,” Rose said accusingly.

“I’m feeling much better today,” Auntie Hilde called from the cart. “I think I’d like to get out of here, stretch my legs a bit.”

“It’s better to keep you in there,” Sirai dropped the strap of the satchel over her shoulder and stood up, toeing dirt over their tiny fire. “If you have a kind of blood poisoning, romping around won't help you.”

Auntie blew her breath out in an upward burst, flicking her dark bangs skyward. “Do I look like the romping type?”

Rose whistled Minx over. As the little dog bounded out of the bushes, she threw a piece of bread into the dog’s smiling maw. Shaking crumbs from her gambeson, she grabbed the hand-rails and manhandled the cart back onto the road. 

The unpleasant dream was already fading, leaving only the sour mood that continuously interrupted sleep had bequeathed to her overnight. 

Sirai hung back, walking alongside the cart at level with Auntie Hilde. As the cart rolled along, she mixed two vials of liquid together, squinting through the smoked glass as she dropped tiny beads of moisture from one vial til the other. 

“That had better not be for me,” Auntie muttered.

“No, not at all. This is for Rose.”

“I’m not sick,” Rose retorted sullenly.

“It’s just a little natural remedy for poor sleep. Here.” She strode up beside Rose and offered out the tincture. 

“I’m a little occupied at the moment,” Rose shook her arms emphatically, as if her hands were shackled to the cart’s hand-rails. Some days, it felt like they were.

She saw--or thought she saw--Sirai roll her eyes. And here she was, thinking the somber young woman only capable of expressing imperious restraint and silent judgment. 

Then Sirai shoved the bottle into her mouth.

It served her right. Rose had done the same thing to Auntie Hilde, but at least the tincture wasn’t piping hot. Still, it tasted like the inside of a shoe, mixed with sour berries. 

“Uhg.” 

Her shoulders hunched up to her ears as an involuntary shudder ran from her pinched-up face to the toes in her battered boots. All at once, Rose felt a surge of energy, radiating out from her belly and into all of her limbs. Her spine snapped up straight, her grip strengthened on the rails. She felt as though she’d jumped in an ice cold stream: clear headed, alert. 

A surprised whoop left her, which Minx echoed with a hardy yip, and Rose marched ahead at double the pace.

“Better?” Sirai asked, poorly concealing a smile.

“Aye,” Rose said cheerily. “Right as a rainbow.”

From behind them, Auntie Hilde called, “I change my mind. I'll have whatever she’s having!”

“Madame Dwarf,” Sirai sighed. “We need you to be less awake, not more.”

Auntie Hilde began to protest, but her eyelids began to flap independently of one another. A drunken smile curved her lips. She took a great yawn, and then thumped back onto her bower of bedrolls with a loud snore.

“And there she goes,” Rose heard Sirai say, with a hint of laughter in her voice.

“You put sleeping draught in her tea.”

“Well, we need her asleep and you awake,” Sirai shrugged helplessly

“And you know what’s best for everyone, right?”

Sirai coiffed the scarf on her head self-consciously. “I’m only trying to help get us through this, as painlessly as possible.” 

“Why’s that?” Rose said, her tone still chipper. “Because you feel guilty about how this all happened?”

“Yes,” Sirai said, unexpectedly. 

Minx went tearing off ahead of them, nipping at the white and yellow butterflies that were just beginning to drift down from the trees. The effect was something like continuously falling flower petals. Her spirit bolstered, Rose looked up at the pink light filtering down from the branches overhead. She could barely remember the dream that had haunted her all night.

As they rounded the bend in the road, following Minx’s delighted noise-making, they found the stocky little little dog standing silently at attention in the center of the path. Rose slowed to a halt, staring at the rigid dog. The iron studs on Minx’s protective leather bear-fighting vest gleamed . The road was deserted. 

For a moment, the only sound was Auntie Hilde’s snoring. Then Minx gave a low growl.

“What is it?” Sirai whispered.

“Don’t know.” Rose sniffed the air. No smell of bear. “Is there any other way through?”

“No. And Elfina said not to leave the road.”

Rose sucked a deep breath in through her nose. 

There really wasn’t much choice then. 

Carefully, she inched toward where Minx stood frozen. The squeaking of the cart’s back right wheel filled her ears, scraping on her nerves. Suddenly, every fluttering butterfly, every rustling leaf, echoed a warning.

Minx snarled. It was the only warning before the healthy, tall tree on the side of the road toppled, roots tearing and timber popping as dirt and branches exploded across the road. 

A massive, lumbering shape the size of a black bull, cut across their path. Shocked into open-mouthed silence, Rose didn’t realize what it was until the creature turned its snout toward them and squealed in rage.

The boar was bigger than any wild pig had any right to be, and its tusks were covered with strips of bark skinned from the trees. Its eyes were gelatinous pools that leaked black ichor. The stuff ran down its face in rivulets. When it turned toward them, hooves tearing into the turf of the pathway, and screamed again, black mucus flew from its gaping jaws.

Rose’s thoughts leapt to the bear spears in the wagon--

Then the boar was thundering toward them. 

“Get in the cart.” Rose shouted, yanking the handrails around so that she was pushing it rather than pulling. “ _Get in the cart!_ ”

Sirai leapt in, catching hold of the side. Rose whistled, and Minx launched her little body up and over into the flat-bed.

“What are you doing?” Sirai cried in panic, her eyes darting from Rose to the beast bearing down on them. “Rose-”

She ran, pushing the cart with all her might. Then they were off the road, careening down the mountainside.

Branches and brush snapped against the sides, whipping past. She heard Sirai cry out, “Not off the road!” but it was too late. Rose kicked her feet up on the back of the cart, and using the rails and her own weight, flung her body fully into the act of steering.

In the cart, Sirai bumped and tumbled over Auntie Hilde’s sleeping body. Minx rolled and yelped in confusion. Pots and pans clattered. But behind them, more deafening than their rushed descent off the road, was the sound of the boar chasing after them, its great hoof-beats shaking the earth. 

“Grab the spear!” Rose yelled, banking hard to the left so that they skimmed right past the trunk of a great ash tree.

Sirai rose up holding one of the heavy cast iron skillets.

“What is _that_ going to do?” Rose’s cry of exasperation was cut off by a mouthful of green leaves.

Sirai wheeled back and threw the skillet as hard as she could, sending it flying over Rose's head and into the boar’s slavering jaws. With a crunch, the skillet clipped off one of the boar’s massive tusks then went spinning off into the blur of the undergrowth.

Gaping back over her shoulder at the sight, Rose was forced to admit that a cast iron skillet, when thrown with enough force, could accomplish what a bear spear could not. 

She laughed, but then the cart wheel jumped over a rock, and the resulting jolt threw Sirai across the cart. Rose snapped her attention to the front of the cart. 

Sirai caught herself on the side, falling full sprawl across Auntie Hilde’s stomach. Auntie Hilde registered nothing more than a snort and a grumble.

“We have to get back on the road!”

“I’m a little busy right now!” Rose threw her body right, curving sharply away from a collection of moss covered boulders. They bumped down another steep drop, and for a moment Minx was airborne, her short legs kicking as if she was swimming in a pond. Sirai reached up and pulled her into a hug.

The boar jumped up onto the rocks, its dark bulk silhouetted menacingly against the sky. For a moment, it waved its snout in search of their scent. Picking it up, it leapt down from the boulders. As it did so, the huge rocks lurched and rolled to the side as if the weight of the beast had displaced them. The sound of clattering stones was interrupted by a different kind of roar; low and grating and nothing like the boar’s furious screech.

Rose glanced back just in time to see one of the stones rise up into a humanoid shape.

One massive fist swung down and smashed the ground next to the boar. The boar wheeled to face the thing, its scream of challenge sending birds scattering from their nests. The last thing Rose saw, before trees obstructed her view, was the monstrous boar charging its attacker and another massive fist reeling back to strike again.

Then there was nothing but fast flying trees and the distant rumble of the earth as the two monsters battled.

“What was that?” Rose cried.

“An ogre, I think,” Sirai said. Then she gave a helpless shrug and a smile. “Elfina told us to stay on the road.”

At that moment, they reached the bottom of the hill, and the cart came flying out from the stand of birch into a swath of land that was empty save for a carpet of moss. Ahead, growing closer and closer, was a veil of grey mist out of which appeared the shapes of naked old oaks. One forest separated from another by a green no-man's-land.

Rose dug her heels down to slow them, but her boots slipped on the moss. The cart gave an unexpected lurch as one of the wheels finally broke with a terrible crack. Sirai screamed as the cart turned onto its side. 

Rose was thrown off, going end over end until her braid came undone from the back of her head. She came to a stop on her hands and knees. Looking up through the fall of loose strands of hair, she watched the overturned cart bump to a relatively kind halt against the base of one of those twisted oaks.

“Are you alright?” Rose called, clamoring to her feet. She scampered over, slipping and sliding, to see Sirai laying atop Auntie Hilde amid the overturned remnants of their supplies. Her turban sat askew, allowing for a tuft of dark hair to fall across her forehead, and Minx was licking her cheek enthusiastically. Below her, Auntie Hilde let out a long, undisturbed snore.

“Give me your hand,” Rose huffed.

She reached down and slipped, falling hard on her backside. For a moment, she sat there, feeling the pound of adrenaline still coursing through her. Her hands were shaking, Then, from the cart, came the smothered sound of laughter.

Sirai’s eyes were squeezed shut and barely restrained tremors of laughter shook her shoulders. Rose stared at her, then slowly her own haggard breaths transformed into gusts of exhausted laughter. Sirai collapsed face first against Auntie Hilde’s shoulder, muffling the sound. Minx wriggled free, barking, and tackled Rose back against the moss. For a long while the pair of them lay there, laughing amid the ruins of all Rose’s scattered worldly possessions.

“What’s happening?” Auntie Hilde muttered, snorting groggily. “Thought I heard something.”

The thread of thought was lost, and the words faded into measured snoring. Sirai shimmied off her and straightened her disheveled headscarf, tucking the errant strands of hair securely back under the cloth. She double checked the satchel that still hung across her body and gave a nod. 

“Everything’s fine in here.”

Allowing Minx to hop off her, Rose climbed to her feet and offered her hand out to Sirai. 

“Well, the cart’s done-for,” she said, hefting the older girl up. “The front axle is snapped and I don’t have-”

“ _Shh_.”

Sirai’s hands fell on her shoulders silencing her. Slowly, she turned Rose around.

Across from them, separated by the stretch of uninterrupted mossy soil that delineated one section of forest from the other, was the ogre. It stood silently, its massive shoulders--the color and texture of granite boulders--heaving up and down. It had a flat, toad-like face with equally toad-like eyes, and it studied them from where it stood with those wide staring eyes. One huge foot made the slightest advance forward, brushing the edge of the moss. Rose stepped in front of Sirai, knowing that if the ogre charged, they would have no choice but to run for their lives. 

But she couldn’t leave Auntie Hilde. No, no matter what. So this little patch of land might very well be where Rose spent her last moments.

Without a sound, the ogre turned, silently sliding the bulk of its form back into the cover of the forest. Only the slightest whisper of rustling branches indicated its departure.

Why hadn’t it attacked? It had certainly looked like it was thinking about it, if any intelligence could be gleaned from those swollen eyes. 

Rose craned her head back, looking at the bare tree branches of the massive oak through the haze of grey mist that lay over the valley floor.

“This is the Dark Forest,” she whispered.


	6. Chapter 6

**_“Do not_ **, under any circumstances, touch the mushrooms.”

Rose tossed the words back over her shoulder, laboring under the weight of the snoring dwarf-woman slung across her back. “And beware of muddy clearings. It’s likely sink-soil.”

The pair of them tiptoed between the gnarled roots of a tree that poked up from the grey soil, carefully skirting the carpet of menacing looking toadstools that had brought about Rose’s warning. Sirai eyed them warily, committing the sight to memory.

It was difficult finding their footing on the treacherous terrain, not just because of the slick mud. The roots seemed designed to snare the unwary.

And they were both terrifically encumbered.

Rose carried Hilde on her back, using the unbroken bear spear as a staff, and Sirai wore Minx in a sling like a baby across her chest. Everything they were able to carry away from the abandoned cart dangled from their bodies: bedrolls, pots, the tea kettle, and the important artifacts from the blighted bear. Along with her hunting knife, Rose now wore a short-sword belted to her hip, and a bandolier of leather pouches filled with Auntie Hilde’s assorted powders.

“And if you spy a marsh-light through the gloom, _do not_ get close. The soil they float over exudes a flammable gas that will make you vomit and faint.”

“I’ll definitely remember that,” Sirai said, twisting one hand into her skirts and hefting them up. They weren’t long, not the trailing petticoats a lady would wear, but even the shin-length skirts seemed too much now. She narrowly avoided catching her hem on a protruding root. “How do you know so much about the Dark Forest? I’ve lived up the mountain from it my whole life and never stepped foot near it.”

From far-off came the abrupt sound of a massive branch snapping and crashing to the forest floor. Both of them froze, motionless. Rose clutched the spear tighter. They waited, expecting something to come charging out of the misty clearings, but there were no sounds of wildlife at all, not even the drone of a cicada. 

Carefully, Rose eased back into a walk but her eyes scanned the trees as she spoke.

“We hunted dark forest bears here a couple of times. They don’t like people and aren't easy to find, but my Auntie taught me a few things about getting around here without ending up a shivering ball of terror. Careful here.”

A mirror-like, brackish pool appeared in their path. Rose re-positioned the spear and delicately turned her body to shuffle, crab-like, along its edge, keeping her back away from the pool. Sirai paused a moment to hike her skirt up and tuck the excess into her belt, then turned to do the same. She kept one hand on Minx the entire time, staring down at where the tips of her boots edged around the water. 

“Do you think we’ll make it out of here before nightfall?” Sirai’s voice was barely above a whisper.

“I certainly hope so,” Rose said.

Out of the corner of her eye, Sirai saw a tall, spindly shape detach itself from the nearby trees. It moved silently, swiftly, and with her back turned to it, Rose would not see it until it was too late. Sirai opened her mouth to give warning, but her footing slipped. The tip of Sirai’s shoe splashed into the pool. The dark water erupted with writing black eels, their backs lined with spiny fins. Minx whimpered as Sirai wheeled out her arms, trying to keep from falling face-first into the seething mass. Then Rose caught hold of her hand and steadied her. 

The writhing in the pond abruptly stilled.

“Are you alright?” Rose asked, carefully guiding her away from the pool’s edge.

“Yes.” Breathless, Sirai stared down at the calm waters, filled with a sickening sensation of dread. “But I thought I saw--” 

She twisted around. There was nothing to see but tree trunks and the low-hanging strands of mist floating between them.

“It feels like there are things moving all around us, just out of sight,” Sirai said. “But when I turn to take a look…”

Rose nodded. “I know what you mean.”

They continued onward but for the rest of the time, they held one another’s hands, steadying each other as they traversed the dangerous soil.

Above, the sun glowed as a cool white circle through the haze.

* * *

Queen Snow White stood atop the seamstress’s stepping-tool, bathed in the bright golden light that slanted down from the large window. Her back half turned toward the door, she gazed at the diamond-cut panes while three seamstresses moved around her, pinning and measuring the fall of rich red cloth that spread out across the floor.

“Like this, your majesty?” asked the head seamstress, approaching with a bolt of black lace. 

“Yes, just like that. That’s perfect,” she said, her eyes fever bright in her pale face. The head seamstress bobbed a curtsy and stepped away to cut a swatch from the bolt.

“I must speak with her, it cannot wait!”

The Duke’s voice was in full fume, echoing in the hallway just outside the seamstress’s door. The girls pinning the queen’s skirt froze, heads craning toward the door just as the Duke entered, King William huffing behind him.

“Father-”

“Your majesty---”

The red-faced Duke fell immediately silent, caught in the startled gazes of the four seamstresses. It was the Queen who looked at him last, slowly turning to favor him with a stony stare.

“Duke Hammond,” she said. “To what do I owe this unexpected visit?”

“Your majesty,” anyone could see the Duke was making a physical effort to restrain his tone.

“I must report to you that after last night's banquet, Lord Reinholden has gone missing. His squires were not made aware of his departure and his horse is still being tended in our stables. Lords Brodovan and Talisen have accused the envoy from Vardhelm of treachery.”

“It’s ridiculous! It makes no sense,” William exploded. “Why would the envoy from Vardhelm kidnap Lord Reinholden?”

“I do not prescribe to their way of thinking,” Every word the Duke spoke was crackling with anger. “But they believe that this is revenge by Vardhelm for...for leaving them to the Ice Queen’s whims during the invasion of the White Lands.”

Snow White listened while he made his impassioned report, her brow pinched in a faint frown. When he finished, she waved the head seamstress over to her side. The woman approached cautiously, holding the swatch of black lace up to the Queen’s bodice.

“We could put it here and add some trimming along the sleeves, my lady,” the head seamstress said softly, all the while trying to ignore the place where The Duke and the King stood in tense silence.

Finally, the Duke had had enough of being ignored.

“Your majesty, I do not know what’s gotten into you. You must concentrate on the matter at hand. One of your loyal lords, a childhood friend of your late father’s, is unaccounted for, and you stand here fawning over _frilly dresses_. ”

“Father,” William said in warning but the Duke waved him off.

“No, I must say my piece. _This_ is not the young woman I fought beside only a year past. That young woman knew her duty. And now--now, I don’t know what to think of you.”

The room fell into uncomfortable silence. Slowly, the Queen extended her hand, and her ladies rushed to help her off the stepping stool. In a soft rustle of fabric, she approached the Duke. Her eyes, when he looked down into them, were unblinking but bright with tears.

“You are the only father I have now, Duke Hammond,” she said in a surprisingly calm tone. He swallowed reflexively, overcome with shame at his outburst. When he tried to turn away, Snow White moved into his line of sight, forcing him to raise his gaze once more. “It would be my greatest regret to bring you shame.”

She laid both pale hands on either side of his face. For a moment, the Duke closed his eyes and a shiver ran from his boots to the top of his head. When he opened his eyes again, he flashed a placating smile. 

“What would you have me do, my lady?”

William had never seen his father so biddable.

Snow White smiled at him, still holding his face between her hands. “I’m certain no harm has come to Lord Reinholden.”

“Yes, my queen.”

“And we will put to rest to these fears the council has. Tonight. Will you see to it?”

She nodded encouragingly and the Duke nodded with her.

“Yes, my queen.”

“Thank you,” she said, releasing him. The Duke bowed and promptly left the room.

Without another word, Snow White turned back to her seamstresses. Holding out her arms to them she continued, as if their conversation had never been interrupted: “Now, for the sleeve here, I think we should perhaps add some volume with the tulle?”

William followed Snow White across the mosaic floor, his mouth opening and closing like a trout thrown on dry land.

“Snow…”

“I had a lovely dream last night,” she said to him, without paying him a glance. “And when I woke, I just knew that I had to have this dress made. Just like the one in my dream.” 

“Snow, if I may speak with you for a moment…”

She laughed but still did not look at him. “Why so dour, Will?”

“Something my father said lit a fire in me. I have been meaning to ask,” he shimmied awkwardly around one of the seamstresses, trying to catch her eye. “Snow, are you feeling alright?”

“I’m feeling wonderful. I don't have a care in the world.”

“But that’s just it. You _should_ have a care. You’re the queen.”

“And you’re the king. Now we are all aware of our relative stations in the world.”

“Snow, I am being serious.”

“Of course you are,” Snow White breathed, a note of exhaustion in her voice. She stopped turning away and motioned for the four seamstresses to fall back, giving the king and queen the space they needed.

“My father is right, you have changed. I’ve noticed it, and I’m worried for you,” He said in a rush. 

“William, you don’t need to worry,” she said with a smile. “I had a dream--”

“Enough! We have real concerns, out here, in the real world.”

William’s voice exploded out of him, ringing with frustration. His father’s disappointment and his own foolish pride weighed heavy on him.

The smile fell from her face. 

Abruptly, Snow White turned away from him. He was left sighing helplessly in exasperation--at her or his own weakness, he was not sure.

“Snow--”

“I often wonder what Eric would have made of all this,” She said. “It’s foolish, I know. But I can’t help but wonder, if I told him of my dreams, would he turn them aside so easily? I wonder if I made the right choice. But then again--he was the one who made the choice for the both of us.”

William felt every drop of righteousness bleed out of him, leaving him cold and chalk pale. All the secret insecurities that had ever haunted him in the midnight hours echoed in his ears. She had wanted Eric, her huntsman-- _her true love._ But he had walked away and left William standing behind, eager and waiting, as a consolation prize. He looked at her turned back, at her fall of raven-dark hair, and resentment boiled like acid in his belly. He took a step back out of the room, aware of the fleeting glances from the four seamstresses. They looked at him with a measure of pity that he could not bear.

“Oh, William,” she whispered, blinking her eyes wide and turning to him as if just awakening from a dream. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean that--”

She came toward him, her hands out, but he quickly sidled away from her.

He turned and strode from the room as if pursued by hounds. 

* * *

“Hammond, I do not see the point of this unless the queen is calling a war tribunal.” Lord Talisen’s voice echoed in the empty throne room hall. 

This was, of course, not the same hall that the Evil Queen had used for her seat of power. That hall had been sealed off and a new wing of the castle put to use as the throne room. During the day, when receiving audiences and petitioners, the stained glass windows glittered like the Sanctuary forest. But now, at this odd hour for the council to be called, the windows were black as night.

All of the lords of the high Council were in attendance, led by Duke Hammond himself. “We should not be talking here. An armed unit should be sent out to turn that Vardhelm envoy back around. Sir Tull should not be allowed to simply leave when we still have no idea where Reinholden is --”

“I’m right here, Talisen.”

The sardonic voice from beside the throne drew the men up short. They had not noticed, due to Talisen’s fervor, that the Queen was standing before her throne, and beside her was Lord Reinholden. 

Reinholden’s mouth curved into a smooth smile.”You weren’t expecting me?”

“Reinholden,” Talisen hoped his laugh would mask his fluster. “Where in the blazes have you been?”

A look passed between the Lord Reinholden and Queen Snow White, and then he gave a bow and left her side. Duke Hammond gave a slight incline if his head, then turned and left the counsel of lords, walking back toward the throne room doors with Reinholden close by.

“Lord Reinholden was fulfilling a request I made of him,” she said, coming toward them with her hands folded neatly across her stomach. “I thank you all for taking the time to come here tonight. I had planned to speak to you all one at a time, but this is much more expedient. I know there has been much contention between you.”

Uncertain glances flitted between the councilmen. 

“It's alright,” Snow White said. “You need not hide anything from me. I know your hearts very well.” Here, she gave a warm smile and stopped to look each of them in the eye, glowing with enough sincerity to shame them. Every man who had whispered or gossiped, even only to each other, felt the burden of his guilt weigh heavy on him. It was like a physical weight, heavier than a stone tied to the boot. It was like being dragged down into a cold well of shame. Talisen tried to look away from the queen, but a dry sob left his mouth.

“Forgive us, my queen,” he blubbered, hardly recognizing his own voice. 

To his dawning horror, he realized the other councilmen around him were sniffling and blotting their eyes. Lord Brodovan was in full, racking sobs, silently covering his face with his hands as he sunk to his knees.”

“Forgive us, my queen!” Brodovan wailed, and the other men began to fall to their feet, their voices rising in a mournful chorus.

“Forgive us! Forgive us!”

The beautiful raven haired queen looked at them with her kind smile and whispered, “Of course. You are all forgiven.”

At the front of the great hall, where Reinholden and Hammond stood together in stony silence, they turned and bolted the door shut.

* * *

“I’m sorry,” Rose said miserably, as she fed Minx strips of dried venison from their supply pack. From across the fluttering flames of their little campfire, Sirai studied her while keeping an eye on the pot of stew she was tending.

“What for?” Sirai asked, ladle poised in her hand.

“I thought I could get us out of the forest in time,” Rose said miserably, ruffling Minx’s ears. Minx’s entire back-end shook back and forth, like a fuzzy excitable caterpillar. “And now…’

 _And now we’re probably going to be eaten by something with too many legs and forearm -length fangs,_ she thought.. 

They'd been so close to the southern edge of the forest when nightfall found them, but it was far too dangerous to try and press on overnight. With their footing precarious even in the light of day, by night it would be impossible. No moonlight showed in the Dark Forest at night. So, they built a fire to fight off the dark and hunkered down amid a circle of hollowed tree trunks. It wasn’t much for fortifications, but it was all they had.

With a huff , Rose shuffled over to where Auntie Hilde dozed and took hold of her injured arm. Carefully, she unraveled the soiled bandaged, exposing the slash marks that marred the flesh. The wound was fever-warm and the once grey veins were now black and crawling up toward the crease of Auntie Hilde’s elbow, like roots seeking sunlight. 

The infection was spreading.

A knot formed in Rose's throat and swallowing around it felt like drinking a tincture filled with burs. 

“Here,” Sirai said gently, handing Rose a roll of fresh linen gauze and a tin of salve. She was suddenly beside Rose, helping to lift Auntie Hilde upright just enough to perfectly rewrap the arm. 

Rose blinked furiously, trying not to audibly sniffle. She was suddenly, acutely aware that Sirai was watching her. Staring downward, looking at the only place she could, she noticed a dark leather string poking up from Auntie Hilde’s collar. Focusing on it, she felt the tears that threatened to spill from her eyes dry.

Carefully, she hooked her finger under the leather thong and drew it out from under the hem of the dwarf-woman’s shirt.

“What is that?” Sirai asked, her face formed into a frown of thoughtfulness.

Rose stared at the medallion for a long moment, watching as it turned this way and that in the glimmer of the firelight.

It was a coin-sized token, flat on one side and slightly domed on the other, with a black enamel front-face. The design was of a tree with spreading bare branches, rendered in silver paint.

She blinked at the design, then glanced across at Sirai. The expression of rapt concentration on Sirai’s face made Rose stop short.

“You recognize the symbol.” It wasn’t a question.

Sucking in a deep breath, Sirai nodded.

“So,” Rose’s voice had a little more edge to it than she had intended. “What does it mean then?”

“It’s the symbol of the royal house,” Sirai turned and looked straight at her, with a single intense stare that weighed on Rose like a ton of boulders on her chest. “Queen Snow White’s coat of arms.”

Rose shook her head. “Why would my aunt have a necklace with the Queen’s coat of arms on it?”

“Are you going to finally keep your mouth closed long enough for me to tell ye, lass?” Rose glanced down to see both of Auntie Hilde’s eyes watching them from under her thick brows.

“How long have you been awake?”

“ _Hush,_ girl!” She flopped her good hand over Rose’s mouth, effectively silencing her, and leaned up to speak into her face. Her voice was still groggy and slurred. “Your father and mother really only had a one-night-affair, but he wasn’t the nobody we told you he was.

“It was the same year they announced the queen’s pregnancy. King Magnus was out traveling the land, and that’s when he stopped at the Old Mill Inn and met your mother.” 

As she spoke, Rose pictured the scene vividly in her mind: _the warm tavern, filled with celebration, of tankards lifted in salutation. Shouts of_ Long Live King Magnus! _The king merely looked like a handsome nobleman sitting down across from her at one of the tables, flanked by two silent, but similarly attired companions. Dressed to look conspicuously inconspicuous. Her auburn haired mother laughing and clinking glasses with him. The light blurring into warm laughter and ending in the king and the auburn haired woman’s embrace._

“He left her in the morning and gave her this medallion with a promise that if a child should come of that night, she could call on him if she needed. And 6 months after the birth of Princess Snow White--well, almost 7 months after. You were _really_ stubborn about that--you were born.”

“And my mother never collected on the king’s token?” 

“Your mama didn’t think she needed to. You were wanted and loved, and she could provide well enough for you. She wanted to keep it for a rainy day.”

“But she never had the chance to use it,” Rose nodded in understanding. “Because she was taken away to the castle by the Evil Queen’s men.”

Auntie Hilde gave a heavy, sad sigh. “Aye,” she said. “They took your mama away with all the other beautiful young women, and I was left to raise you up the rest of the way. Your mother was my dearest friend. I could never leave you to anyone else.”

Rose could feel the laughter itching at the back of her throat. It just all seemed so ridiculous--the stupidest joke Auntie could ever play. How was she good ‘ol King Magus’s bastard daughter, half-sister of the fairest woman in all the land? With her bear-scarred cheek, her unruly red hair, her broad shoulders and thick waist, she knew herself well enough to know she was not what anyone would call _fair._

She became aware that Sirai was studying her with an odd, unreadable expression. Perhaps she was also trying to see in Rose’s features the hallmarks of her royal sire.

“Well,” Rose said after a moment. “I guess we have our fool-proof method of getting an audience with Queen Snow White.”

“The medallion?” Sirai asked softly.

“Of course,” Rose laughed. “ I don’t want anything else from the lot of them. I just want the queen to heal my aunt.”

“But you’re a princess,” Sirai said, visibly confused. 

Rose snorted dismissively. “Is that what you see?”

“No, not really,” she said. “I just see you.”

“Then can’t we just go back to you thinkin’ of me as nothing more than the ugly bear-hunter you maneuvered into this quest of yours?”

Sirai smiled, a bit sheepishly. “I never thought of you as ugly, Rose.” 

“That’s very cute,” Auntie Hilde broke in. “But I’m starvin’.”

Rose blinked in surprise, and in the moment, Sirai quickly twisted away and went back to the fire, self-consciously touching her scarf. Rose wasn’t certain what had just happened, but it was definitely...something. Panting, Minx dove between them and landed on Auntie’s chest, gleefully licking her face. 

Her breath burst out of her in an _oof,_ but she seemed none the worse for it despite being a convalescent. Rose had the thought that she should go help Sirai ladle out the stew but as she rose to go, Hilde stopped her.

“And maybe you should take this then, eh?” She twirled the medallion on its string, causing it to glitter in the firelight. 

“Me? Why”

Auntie Hilde smirked. “I only meant to hold on to it until I had need to tell you about it. Now that you know, there’s no reason for me to have it.” She looked at it almost wistfully, then shoved it up at Rose with growing impatience. “Take it off my hands. And bring me over some of that grub.”

She knew it was all bluster, but she let Auntie Hilde have her pride.She dropped the medallion around her neck and crouched down beside the fire. Picking up one of the soup-bowls, she took the ladle when Sirai offered it. For a moment, their fingers touched.

From behind them came Auntie Hilde’s frustrated growl, “And where’s the hell’s the _bloody_ cart?”

Sirai ducked her head, smothering a laugh behind her palm.

“Ah, you see Auntie…”

“Don’t tell me you wrecked me cart, lass!”

“It’s not as if I did it on purpose!” 

“That cart’s coming out of your wages, princess!”

“Don’t call me that!” Rose spun on her, soup slopping over the side of the bowl in her hand. She hissed in pain, flicking off a few beads of the thick brown stock.

“That cart was older than you!”

Sirai burst into peals of helpless laughter, so entirely unexpectedly that both Rose and Hilde looked at her in amazement.

“I’m sorry, really,” she said, her shoulders quaking. She waved her hand at them. “Go on, go on, don’t mind me.”

“Are we amusing you, madame?” Rose snarked.

“What’s not to be amused by?” snorted Auntie Hilde. “We’re just a princess and her entourage on a nice summer picnic.”

“Fine then,” Rose snorted. “Sirai is a dryad, I’m a princess and you’re a pixie.”

“How dare you--”

The banter went back and forth, on and on, and Sirai laughed helplessly all the while. It was good not to be afraid--not to feel burdened. The Dark Forest was not so daunting. The fire burned brighter, and the sky overhead, for an instant, showed a clearing of beautiful, glittering stars.


	7. Chapter 7

**_Full_ ** moon light fell over the castle battlements, glittering off the face of the stretching ocean. The salt-damp air was cool up on the wall, but welcome. The smell was one he’d grown up with, but for ten years he’d been away. Tonight, he should have dined with Snow White--not an official banquet but a private supper with only the two of them, and perhaps his father. But his anger, and the guilt that came after it, kept him away. His stomach gnawed at him, but sleep would have been better. In the lean years, hiding from the Evil Queen, he’d known hunger. One night without a four-course meal would not leave him a wasted wraith.

He leaned with his crossed arms on the parapet, closing his eyes for one moment to let the wind scour his face and hair. 

When he opened his eyes, he was not alone.

A slim, gowned figure floated toward him along the battlements, hair streaming to the side like one of the billowing flags overhead. Her face reflected back the cool light of the moon. He needed no lantern to see who she was.

His wife, Queen Snow White, silently glided to his side. She stopped only a few steps away from him and turned, placing both hands on the parapet. In profile, she looked like an image stamped on a coin: too-perfect. 

Neither one of them spoke but the sound of the ocean waves roaring below and the flap of their own garments whisking in the wind filled the silence. 

“William,” she said at last, her voice was like the voice she had used on that night when she had roused an army to fight with her: brave, yet afraid. Brave  _ because _ she was afraid.

Something wasn’t right. 

“I don’t know what’s happening to me,” She said, hands curling into fists atop the wall. “Sometimes I feel….I feel as if I’m two different people. As if someone else is speaking through my mouth, with my voice and I can do nothing to stop it.”

Whatever anger he had felt vanished and a very real, deep fear filled him. William turned to her only to find her staring back at him, her eyes wide and frightened.

“Remember when you sent the mirror to the Sanctuary forest?”

“Yes, but that was different,” She shook her head adamantly. “I knew that the cause was the mirror. I could  _ hear _ its evil. But now… It’s me, William. It’s coming from me.”

“No,” he said it reflexively. “You killed the Evil Queen. Her mirror was shattered in the war in the White Lands. It’s over and done with.”

Snow White shook her head, more and more frantically, then turned and bowed her head against the parapet. The curtain of her dark hair muffled the sound of a miserable, barely smothered sob.

“No. It’s not over yet. The story isn't finished.”

William wrapped an arm around her and drew her up from where she had sunk against the wall. She seemed suddenly very fragile in his arms, in a way he never thought she could. She had always seemed so resilient, but now she seemed to sag against him, as if she couldn't carry her own weight.

Her face was wet with tears.

“We have to go to Sanctuary,” her voice quavered, but she held her chin up, as he half-carried her to the battlement stairs.“I must go to the heart of the forest.” They began to descend. William's only thought was that he ought to get the queen to her rooms as quickly as possible. She seemed to be weakening with every step. 

When at last they reached her rooms, she fainted just on the threshold and William was forced to pick her up and carry her to her bed. Her two chambermaids were at the fireplace, dutifully tending the flames, but as the king carried the queen in, the pair of them started upright, their faces transforming from scandalized to alarmed as they realized that this was not some romantic tryst they were inadvertently party to.

“Please, the queen is not feeling well,” William called to them. “Wake the royal physician.”

“Yes, your majesty!” The blonde chambermaid curtsied and rushed from the room, her feet pattering across the tiled floor. The brunette who remained raced to the queen’s sideboard. From there came the clink and clatter of glasses as the girl poured her queen a drink.

William lowered Snow White atop the coverlet of her bed, watching as she sank into the down feather cushions. For a moment, her dark lashes were lowered and her hair spread out across the pillow, and he had the unbidden thought that she looked as she had the night they had laid her body on the bier, and she had seemed dead to all the world.

A knot formed in his throat.

“Your majesty?” The chambermaid held out a glass. William carefully lifted Snow White just enough to gently press the cup to her lips. She took a sip, then coughed weakly. William handed the glass back to the chambermaid.

“We must leave at first light, William,” Snow said, opening her eyes abruptly. She groped for his hand. He caught her hand in his grasp and clasped both of his over hers, rubbing his thumbs over her knuckles. “Everything must be ready to go. The council of lords must come with me. Promise you’ll have everything ready at first light.”

“I promise, Snow.” 

She closed her eyes again, and remained laying there. Then quietly, her lips barely moving, she whispered, “Go now.”

“Yes, of course.”

Carefully, he stooped down and pressed a kiss to her temple. Placing her hand atop the coverlet, he rose. Spying the brunette chambermaid fidgeting close by, he addressed her. “Tend to the queen until the physician arrives. I’ll return within the hour.”

She curtsied, and William turned to go. He almost strode from the room, but something caused him to hesitate. He turned back to look at Snow White, pale and motionless. He blinked the moisture from his eyes, spun on his heel, and all but ran from the room.

Atop the coverlet, Snow White’s eyes opened abruptly.

Smoothly, she rose upright and swung her legs over the side of the bed.

The chambermaid rushed to help her stand, but Snow White merely held up her hand. 

“It’s alright,” She said. “You may leave me.”

The poor girl’s eyes flicked from her queen to the door. Her lip quivered, just slightly.

“But your majesty...?”

“Am I not your queen?”

There was a hardness in her voice that the little chambermaid had never heard before. Confused, and now a little afraid, she gave a bob of her head.

“Then  _ go _ .”

This time, the girl did not hesitate.

Alone at last in her room, Queen Snow White slowly glided across her floor. The firelight played with the darkness lingering in the deepest corners of the room, throwing her own shadow out long behind her. As she had asked, the seamstresses had brought her completed gown to her chamber and left it elegantly draped over a headless cloth mannequin. It stood before the fire, the beading in the sleeves and collar glittering like drops of black ink. She stopped before it, allowing her fingertips to trace up the sleeve and then the collar.

Yes, it was _ exactly  _ as she had imagined it.

With a smile, she left the gown for her dressing table and sank down onto the little cushioned bench. For a long moment, she stared at her own face: a white oval surrounded by darkness. Her eyes looked like two black pools, reflecting only the firelight. She drew in a deep breath,and picked up her silver-handled hairbrush. She drew the soft bristles through her hair, listening to the quiet whisper of sound at each pass. 

To her left, out of her line of sight, came the soft whisper of fabric. She did not turn to look as a slender figure wearing her new black and red gown quietly moved to stand behind her. A pale white hand fell gently on her shoulder. 

Snow White looked at her reflection in the mirror, at the figure standing behind her, and smiled.


	8. Chapter 8

**_Morning,_ ** and a solitary farmer was out feeding his chickens in the yard. His family lands had shared a border with the Dark Forest for 3 generations, and that was all well and good as long as one kept the gate in good repair. Pigs were smart enough to not wander too close to the forest, but chickens didn't know better and there was no telling them.

Once something went into the Dark Forest, it usually didn’t come out of the Dark Forest. That morning, though, something did.

“Can you tell us if we’re close to Snow White’s castle?”

The farmer glanced up from his chickens, blinking rheumy eyes at the two figures that stood in the dissipating morning mist. Ribbons of steam curled off their shoulders as the sun burned the night’s fog off the farmland.

It took him a moment to realize it was a tall, ugly redheaded girl who was talking to him, not some troll. She was loaded up like a pack mule with a dwarf-woman playing piggyback on her spine. Behind her, almost hidden by her bulk, was a slim brown skinned woman wearing a turban. She had a stout little herding dog strapped to her chest, the kind with short legs and a long body. As he stared, the young woman with the turban unlatched the little dog from its harness and set it on the ground. Immediately, the dog went tearing off into the field, cutting manic figure-8's in the high grass. 

The tall girl leaned into his line of vision, bringing with her the scowling face of the she-dwarf.

“Hullo?” the she-dwarf voice crackled like a crow’s and she had a sickly look about her--dark grey circles around her eyes and sunken cheeks. 

“Ah, yeah?” the farmer blinked.

“Snow White’s Castle?” the red-haired girl prompted.

“Yeah, it’s off that way.” He pointed out across the fields, his gaze wandering back along the path they’d taken from the forest to his fence. “Did you all...come out of _ there _ ?”

“The Dark Forest?” the red-haired girl said. ”Yeah.”

“What's wrong with her?” He jerked his chin toward the dwarf woman. “She’s lookin’ a lil cursed, eh?”

“We’re in a bit of a hurry,” there was an edge of irritation in the red-head’s voice. “So if you wouldn’t mind pointing us towards the road?” 

“Aye,” the farmer said, sighing through his nose. Young people were always in a hurry. “Right over there by the ash tree you'll see a road marker. You follow those out a half mile to the castle road. If you reach the town of Queen’s Reach, then you know you’re going the right way.”

The young woman in the turban reappeared, teakettle on her belt jingling as she strode over. 

“Thank you, sir,” she said with the distant air of a noble lady. “We'll be on our way.”

She dipped her head and he felt himself compelled to bow his head in turn, thought a little awkwardly. Chickens dancing around his feet, he stood scratching his head as the odd troup marched off toward the road. Muttering, the farmer was just turning back to chores when the short little little dog came flying out of the grass, barking gleefully as it ran circles around the yard. Chickens flew upward into the farmer’s face in a hurricane of feathers and fluttering wings, squawking in alarm. The chicken feed spilled across the dirt as he dropped the pail and flung his arms up to cover his face.

A sharp whistle pierced the morning air, stopping the dog in its tracks. 

“Minx! Come on!” the red-head called.

Then the dog was off like an arrow, speeding off through the grass.

“Sorry!” the girl called, waving her boar spear in the air amicably.

Covered in feathers, chickens perched on his shoulders and head, the poor old farmer lifted a hand and numbly waved them away.

* * *

A half mile down the farmer’s little road, the view opened up on a sweeping view of verdant hills and cultivated farmer fields. The land sloped gently down, hump after hump, to the silver band of the sea, cool and calm like the blade of a sword in the morning light. From where they stood, they could see just see the promontory where the queen’s great castle stood, sitting out over the sea, the rock of the cliff and the stones of the fortress married so expertly that it was impossible to tell where the old architects had merely carved out the natural stone, and where they had begun to build nearest. 

Rose caught her breath as a small gust of seaward wind whipped the loose strands of her braid around her face.

“It doesn’t seem so far away,” she said.

“Then you can afford to let me walk on my own for a bit,” Auntie Hilde grumbled, swatting her shoulder. “Put me down.”

“Madame-dwarf,” Sirai said severely. “I don’t think that’s wise.”

“Oh, come on. It’s not as if I’ll drop dead on the side of the road. It would be in poor taste to die before I make the queen’s acquaintance.” She shot Sirai a toothy grin, but it looked more like a grimace of pain. Sirai caught Rose’s eye, and shook her head slightly.

“Put me down,” Hilde demanded, more fiercely this time.

With a sigh, Rose bent down enough for Hilde to slide off. Her boots hit the ground with a stumble and Rose reached out to catch her only to be impatiently waved away.

“Enough!” Auntie Hilde barked, with such venom that Rose immediately went stone faced and silent. 

She studied the bandage on her aunt’s arm, seeing the places where black stains mottled the linen.What could she say, though? Auntie Hilde would do what she wanted.

Hilde snapped her attention to Sirai. “One of them awake-potions, eh? That’ll get me on my way.”

Without a word, Sirai fished a vial out of her satchel and pushed it into Hilde’s hand.

Tossing her head back, Auntie Hilde gulped the draught down. Her face barely registered the foul taste as she handed the vial back. Clapping her hands together she gave an energetic, “Let’s go!” and started off.

She tottered a few weak steps forward on her own until Rose offered her the bear spear. Glaring sideways at it, Hilde’s first impulse was to shove the thing away and insist she needed no help. Reluctantly, however, she conceded, and snatched it out of Rose’s grasp. 

Switching it from her left to right hand, she adjusted her grip and then started off down the road at a confident pace.

Minx trotted beside her, pink tongue hanging from the corner of her mouth. Still wearing a frown on her face, Rose silently fell in step behind her. 

Without a word, Sirai reached across the gap between them and took Rose’s hand in her own.

* * *

The 12 lords of the Queen’s council were gathered in the courtyard, just as the first rays of morning light cut over the battlement walls and grazed the courtyard. A line of stable boys lead out the lords’ horses, their barding glinting in the light.

“Are they going to war?” asked one of the maids, watching from the stairs. “I thought this was a pleasure outing.”

At that moment, the queen and king stepped out into the yard arm in arm, and the maids swept into low curtsies. 

The king was attired in simple garments appropriate for a day's travel, but the gown the queen wore was astonishingly beautiful and far more decorative than what they had come to expect from her. It was made of red fabric that shimmered with every motion, overlaid with black embroidery of flowers and vines. The more one looked at it, the more the ivy vines looked like thorn bushes whose branches crawled menacingly downward across the queen's bodice and onto her sleeves and skirts.

Two maids accompanied her, holding the trailing skirts of glittering gauze out of the dirt.

As the queen neared her lords, they all sunk to one knee--an odd form of obeisance usually only reserved for fealty ceremonies. They stayed there, heads bowed, until Snow White nodded for them to rise.

The sight of his own father kneeling in the dirt gave William pause. 

He wanted to say, “Father what are you doing?” but was interrupted by the young stable hand who led Snow White’s horse over to her.

“Pardon me, your majesty,” the boy demurred, offering out the reins of her favorite white gelding. The creature was elegantly attired in a horse  caparison of midnight blue with the royal white tree emblazoned on its side. As her eyes scanned over it, Snow White’s eyes brightened with pleasure. 

Carefully, she slid her hand out of the crook of William’s arm and reached out to take the reins, When she did, the horse whinnied in alarm.

The poor stable boy nearly fell over as Lord Reinholden nudged the boy out of the way and seized the gelding by the bridle 

“Are you alright, your majesty?” William barely recognized his father’s voice. It seemed uncustomarily docile.  _ Cloying _ was a less charitable word, but it was the one that came to mind, He watched as the Duke took Snow White’s hand in both his own, and kissed her ring.

“Yes I’m fine,” She said, but her eyes were fixed solely on the gelding. “Hold him steady,” she said to Reinholden, extracting her hand from the Duke’s without a second glance.

She walked around to the horse's head, even as the animal continued to whicker. The gelding held his head up straight and the whites of his eyes showed. William knew this horse and knew that not only was he of extremely sturdy temperament, but that he loved Snow White. Now, William watched as Reinholden and the Duke manhandled the horse’s head downward by the bridle so that Snow White could clasp the gelding by both sides of the bridle and look it straight in the eyes.

His nostrils flared, and it seemed for a moment that the gelding tried to turn his head away. Then, he went still.

“There, there,” said Snow softly, stroking the gelding’s white velvet muzzle. “That’s better. Now--” She gestured wordlessly and the Duke helped her up into the saddle. As she settled into place, her maids scampered around, fixing her gown so that the skirts draped beautifully over the horse’s flanks. 

When they were done, the maids bowed and melted out of the way.

As William gazed up at her, resplendent in that uncharacteristic gown, an unbidden thought tugged at him. He almost gave it attention, almost listened to it, but then Snow White spoke.

“Everyone, mount up. Let's be off.”

The lord immediately found themselves in their horse’s saddles. William, feeling as if he was awakening groggily from some unpleasant dream, glanced back over his shoulder and found a stable-hand standing there, waiting for him with William’s horse.

Like a sleepwalker, William, too, mounted up, and drew up alongside the queen.

The gates clattered open. With only the lightest flap of the reins, the queen’s white steed cantered out beneath the arch . Her entourage rode after her, following the banner of her silky black hair.

* * *

“I just need to have a sit-down for a moment…” Auntie Hilde eased herself down atop a small boulder at the side of the road, wheezing gently between her teeth.

“Auntie, if you’re not feeling well--”

“I don’t need you hauling me around like a sack of potatoes,” Auntie growled. “I’ve got my pride, you know.”

Sirai shifted slightly on her feet. “Madame Dwarf, perhaps if you take a sleeping tincture instead--”

Auntie Hilde glanced up, eyes blazing. “I’ve had enough of those. If I’m going to die, I’m going to see if coming--wide awake, do you hear me?”

She threw herself to her feet, but her feet, or the spear, caught her up. She clattered to the ground in an ungainly heap. Minx just managed to skitter out of her way as she hit the dirt.

Rose dove to her side. Together, she and Sirai rolled Hilde over onto her back. She didn’t protest this time. Carefully, Rose dusted the dirt of the road off her aunt’s face and only then realized that the grey hue of her lips was not due to the dust of the road. 

Her entire face had taken on a sickly grey undertone. 

Rose swallowed hard, feeling a helpless sob well up in her throat. Grief and anger warred inside her and she squeezed her eyes closed, refusing to allow her anger to leak out through her eyes.

Beside her, Minx whimpered softly and licked her cheek. 

“Get me on my feet, lassie,” croaked Auntie Hilde. “We’re nearly there. I’ve not got my heart set on expiring now.”

“You’d better not,” Rose snarled vehemently, her own voice coarse. “It would be a pathetic story to tell if you died within sight of the castle.”

Auntie Hilde chuckled weakly, her hand going to the medallion around Rose’s neck. She gaze at it for a long moment, smoothing her thumb over the enameled emblem.

Carefully, Rose got to her feet, cradling Hilde in her arms.

The thunder of approaching hoof-beats rolled across the hillside like an afternoon storm. Down the hill, at the curve of the road, a troop of mounted riders appeared. From where Rose stood, it was difficult to tell how many of them there were exactly, but they made such a clatter that Rose thought it must be a whole cavalry.

“Maybe we should get off the road,” Rose said.

“They have to see us,” Sirai said.

“They’re coming on pretty fast.”

A veil of dirt surrounded the horses’ churning hooves. It was nearly impossible to see through it, save for the glint and glimmer of armor and swords. 

“They’re not slowing down!” 

Minx whimpered and ran, and the young women at last realized what the little dog had figured out first. 

“Jump!” Auntie Hilde bellowed.

They dove right and rolled into the grassy barrow pit on the side of the road. An instant later, they were nearly deafened by the roar of the passing horses. Clods of freshly broken earth rained sown open them, exploding on impact. The line went on and on, the thundering never ending. Finally it faded into silence.

Carefully, Rose rolled away from the green grass, still holding her aunt clutched protectively against her chest. 

Hilde miserably spit Rose’s medallion out of her mouth, coughing.

“Mad men!” Hilde fumed. “Slop for brains!”

Sitting up, Sirai flicked the dirt from her shoulders. 

“They nearly ran us over! On the royal road!” She said indignantly. 

“You can launch a formal complaint with the queen regarding road safety and etiquette once we reach the castle,” Rose muttered, getting her legs back under her. “You alright, Minxy?”

Smiling, the dog popped out of a roadside bush.

“Alright, then,” Rose said, grim-faced. “From now on, we walk to the side of the road.”


	9. Chapter 9

**_During_ ** the reign of the Evil Queen, the prosperous town of  _ Queen’s Reach _ had gone from being the most prosperous rest-stop along the castle road to a muddy hovel. The unpaved streets had overflowed and starving orphans wandered the streets like shambling corpses, their cheeks hollow and their clothes in tatters.

In the time since Snow White was crowned, the village had grown once again into a bustling hub with active markets and trade.

Runners of bright fabric crisscrossed the multiple squares where stalls had been set up for commerce. In this square, there were only fabric sellers, their makeshift shelves overflowing with bolts of satin, lace, silk and twill. A hawker in a stall filled only with scarves beckoned to Sirai as they passed, holding out a yard of green, blue and gold thread that had been woven into a pattern of leaves and blossoms.

A street away, the stalls were filled with fruits and vegetables. A smiling woman popped a red berry into Rose’s mouth as she walked past, hoping to win a sale. It was the first time Rose had ever eaten a strawberry. A seller teasingly offered Minx what looked like a tuber, and she sneezed and siddled away, trying to keep from being stepped on by shuffling feet.

Finally the crowd opened up onto a fountain courtyard and the sound of a band winding their song to an end filled the air. The drums gave a crescendo and the crowd applauded merrily, bright coins flying through the air as a large woman in a bright yellow dress leapt up onto the edge of the fountain, swept off her feathered cap, and held it out to catch the coins.

“And there’s more where that comes from! See us tonight at  _ The Singing Siren Inn _ . We’ll be playing there every night until the harvest moon!”

The audience disbursed, leaving Rose and her friends standing there, distinctly out of place. 

“You’re looking a little lost,” the musician in the yellow dress said archly, and she dumped the coins in her hat into the purse on her hip. On the ground at her feet, the drummer--a big pale man with his hair spiked up like a rooster comb--was helping scoop up the stray coins that had fallen into the lute player’s case.

“We’re trying to get to the castle,” Sirai said. “We seek an audience with the queen.”

“Ah, you’ll be waiting a bit--” the lute player was a whip-thin brown man with a black curling moustache and elegantly lined eyes. He wore a wreath of fresh flowers atop his curly black hair. “Word is, Queen Snow White has canceled her audiences for the rest of the week.”

“A week?” Rose cried, echoed but an emphatic bark from Minx.

All three of the musicians stopped and stared at her with a matching trio of blank expressions rendered in the 3 different hues of their faces. 

“It’s alright, Rose.” Sirai’s tone was meant to comfort but there was something about the pitying look on her face that filled Rose with directionless anger.

“Alright? Just look at her!” Rose was fuming, her throat closing on pointless tears. “She can’t wait a week.”

“I can hear you,” Auntie Hilde slurred, her words muffled on Rose’s shoulder.

“Well, if you’ll be needing a place to stay for tonight,” the woman in the yellow dress approached them, smoothly donning her feathered hat. She smiled at them with the easy calm of a seasoned performer. This close up, Rose noticed that what she thought was a birthmark on the pink-cheeked woman’s face was actually a tiny gold heart, painted just above the right corner of her mouth. “Might I recommend  _ The Singing Siren _ ?”

“Aye, they’ve got a tavern?” Hilde grumbled. “I’ll get me some grog ‘n settle in…”

“Auntie,” Rose chided.

But Sirai, ever fastidious, simply said, “That sounds like just the right place for us. Lead the way.”

“Alright, then,” the lute-player said with a bright smile. “But I hope at least one of you knows how to sing.”

* * *

The swinging double-doors to  _ The Singing Siren _ parted and song wafted out on air scented with the aromas of baking cinnamon and frying bacon.

Feet stomped out the rhythm and the whine of a hurdy-gurdy spun the melody. 

_ Through the Dark Forest come to light _

_ Past ashes, woe, and blood in fight _

_ Her sword raised high, her heart filled with might _

_ A land washed clean as pure snow white _

Hardy voices all around the tavern joyously chimed in, chanting the last line “Snow White, Snow White, Snow White!” Mugs crashed together. Grog slopped over table tops.

_ Our Queen in deed, our Queen in right _

_ Our land washed clean by pure Snow White! _

“Sounds like everyone in here is big fans of the queen,” Rose said to Sirai, eyes squinting as if that would somehow muffle the sound.

“What?” Sirai called, cupping a hand to her ear. “I can barely hear you!”

At her feet, Minx’s pointed ears swiveled this way and that. Then, a hunk of something savory and delicious bounced off a nearby table. Without a by-your-leave, the little dog was off, gobbling scraps up off the floor.

“Hey!” Rose called after her. “Behave yourself!”

Minx, shameless, showed no signs of stopping.

“Here you go!” The woman in the yellow dress said. “Welcome to  _ The Singing Siren _ . Get yourself a room and mug of grog, and then come join us!” The musician with the curly moustache gave them a wink and strutted away, followed by the big pale man with his spiked hair. He had to duck to get under the door jam.

“Marigold!” The tone of voice was friendly, but blared out like a bugle horn from the corner beside the door. “How’s my favorite songstress?”

“Merry as always!” She said, laughing until her cheeks flushed an even darker shade of red. “And look, I brought you more guests!” 

The inn-keeper was a big, smiling man with a face covered in the faded blue tattoos of a former sailor. 

“As long as they sing as pretty as you,” he said, chuckling.

“Go on,” the yellow-clad woman--Marigold-- said. Then she gave a flourish of her cap, and turned away. “How is everyone doing!” She bellowed to the crowd. 

Three dozen voices called back in joyous unison: “ _ Marigold _ !”

As Rose and Sirai shuffled up to the podium, the inn-keep took one look at Auntie Hilde and asked, “ What’s wrong with her?” His gaze darted from face to face, but lingered on Auntie Hilde with what seemed genuine concern.

“She’s not contagious or anything,” Sirai said quickly. “Just injured. My friends are bear hunters and she has a bad wound.”

“Bear-hunting--that’s messy work,” the inn-keerper said with a sympathetic hiss. “I’d not have the stomach for it. But what can we do for you here?”

“A room,” Rose said impatiently. “I have coin to pay you for it.”

“If you want to make a donation to the house, you’re welcome,” the inn-keep said, eyeing her thoughtfully. “And it’s always proper to tip the ones that bring your food and drink. But here at  _ The Singing Siren _ , I take payment for all first night lodgers in the form of a song.”

“A song?” Rose could hardly believe what she was hearing.

“I used to be a sailor,” the inn-keep gave a deep laugh, pointing to the blue ink on his face. “Friend of the sea, if you couldn't tell by these. I’m not built for that life anymore, but I like to keep in sight of the sea, and I like to keep song in the rafters. Nothing passes the time quite like a song.”

“So, all we have to do is sing a song,” Rose tilted her head at him skeptically. “And our room is paid for tonight?”

“That’s right,” the inn-keep said. 

“Alright,” Rose said gruffly. “Sign us up.”

“Right! Room for how many?”

“Three. And a dog.” 

“Can the dog sing? Ha-ha, I’m kidding! And your name, miss?”

“Rose Red.”

“For your hair, I bet. That’s a fitting moniker!” The inn-keeper nodded matter-of-factly. “Alright then. Your room is up those stairs there. The door marked with the number 3. You can't miss it” He pointed behind him, to where a narrow staircase led up into a dimly lit hall. 

“Thank you,” Sirai said as they made for the stairs, moving into a single file line. 

“And don't forget, you owe us a song!” he called after them.

In the little room upstairs, they laid Hilde on a cot and plied her with medicine. In the end, the only thing that convinced her to drink was the promise of a mug of grog when she awoke.

While Auntie Hilde snored on her cot, Rose stripped to her trousers and linen undershirt to scrub off in the little table side basin.

“I can’t sing worth spit,” Rose muttered, settling down into a little wooden stool beside the basin. She started pulling a comb through her damp tresses. Around her neck, the medallion swung like a pendulum.

“Everyone can sing a bit,” Sirai said amicably as she wrapped a green scarf around her curling black hair. The motions were so expertly practiced that she needed no mirror.

Rose rolled her eyes. “Maybe where  _ you’re _ from.”

“Oh, come on. I believe in you. Give it a try.”

“What would you like to hear?” Rose smirked. “How about ‘Weasels in my Boot’?  _ There are three angry weasels in my boot, toss one out, shove in your foot. How many weasled in my boot? Two angry weasels in my boot!” _

On her cot, Auntie Hilde stirred and muttered disapprovingly.

“See?” Rose gestured emphatically. “Sorry, Auntie,” she whispered, leaning over the bed.

Shaking her head, Sirai waved her hands in surrender. “Alright, you win. I’ll just have to handle this on my own.”

“And while you do that,” Rose began to twist her damp hair into a tight braid. “I’ll be sitting by giving my sincerest support.”

“Thank you so much,” Sirai chuckled.

“But tomorrow, we continue onward to the castle” Rose stood up, wrapping her braid around her head and pinning it in place. “I have the king’s medallion. The queen might put me off for a week if I arrived as just a bear hunter. But as King Magnus’s bastard, I can  _ demand _ the queen see me. Then she’ll heal my aunt.”

“And then we’ll warn her about the blighted animals.”

“Yes,” Rose said.

A soft scratching at the door immediately drew their attention. Rose took two long strides and flung open the door. There was no one outside the door, just the empty hallway echoing with noise from the dining room downstairs. Then she looked down.

Minx cocked her head to the side, flipping her ears in consternation.

Rose planted a fist on her hip. “Now you’ve decided to show yourself.”

The little dog whimpered piteously, her brows dipping in a perfectly remorseful expression.

“Fine, get in here,” Rose jerked her thumb back over her shoulder, and the dog bounded inside. She took a pass around the room, sniffing under the cots and nosing their discarded belongs before hopping up onto the cot nearest to Auntie Hilde and burrowing into it..

Rose shrugged into her gambeson then tucked the medallion under her collar.

“Ready,” she said.

“Ready,” Sirai echoed. 

Rose turned to find her standing there in a pale green dress that matched the green of her hair scarf. It was stitched along the collar and hem with a delicate motif of sparrows. 

“Where’d you get that from?” Rose asked in astonishment. 

“This?” Sirai fanned out the skirts a little, turning gently this way and that so that they swished around her legs. “I had it in my pack. It was for my audience with Queen Snow White but I thought it would do for this occasion, too. You don’t think it’s too much, do you? ”

“No,” Rose said. “You look just perfect.”

They shared a smile, and Rose let herself feel that smile deep in her chest.

“Let’s not keep your audience waiting,” She said, offering her arm like a proper escort.

Sirai covered a laugh with her palm, sweeping a playful curtsy before she slid her hand into the crook of Rose’s arm. 

Minx stood up as they headed out the door, ready to follow.

“No,” Rose pointed at her with her free hand. “Stay here Minx. You have to keep a watch on her. I’m counting on you.”

With an almost human sigh, Minx planted her bottom firmly back on the bed, her big brown eyes staring regretfully at the door until the moment it snapped shut.

The moment the pair of them appeared at the bottom of the stairs, the inn-keeper gave a big grin. “Are you ready for that song and dance number?”

“Song only,” Sirai said. “No dance.”

“I’m only here for moral support,” Rose echoed.

“Fine by me.” He gave a whistle so piercingly loud that Rose was certain it could've been heard through a hurricane. The noise in the room lulled somewhat. “We have a new guest!”

“A new guest!” cried Marigold, shaking a tambourine over her head. The crowd whooped in delight.

“Good luck,” Rose whispered to Sirai, releasing her.

Sirai turned and walked toward the stage, a drum-roll announcing her.

“We have a soloist!” Marigold announced.

Marigold and the handsome lute-player offered their hands down, and lifted Sirai up onto the little stage. Whispers passed between the yellow-clad woman and Sirai, then with a shared nod among the trio of musicians. Turning her toward the audience, they both gave a little flourish. “Will the house welcome Mistress Sirai!” 

A smattering of applause rippled across the room. Clutching at the medallion through her gambeson, Rose found her way to the corner of the nearest empty table. The lute player struck up the first flurry of notes. 

_ Have you seen the fairy forest by the light of the winter moon? _

_ Have you seen the sunrise move through trees always in full bloom? _

_ Come child fear nothing on this path you walk _

_ Sanctuary calls you  _

Sirai’s voice started soft, gently buffeted by the chime of the lute. Now, the drums gently rumbled in accompaniment, not so much a beat as a sound like thunder coming on in the distance, and Sirai’s voice strengthened as she came into the second stanza:

_ Have you wondered where your dreams rest when you are wide awake? _

_ And have you ever wished for a balm that could soothe a heartache? _

_ Well, child, fear nothing on the path you walk _

_ Sanctuary, Sanctuary calls you _

_ A sip of sweetwater will salve your pain, _

_ A single flower chase your ails away, _

_ All you need to is remember the way _

_ And nothing that harms you can stay _

_ Remember when all the world is heavy hearted _

_ Remember when your sorrows cannot be parted _

_ Come, child fear nothing though the path is dark _

_ Sanctuary calls you home _

The quiet tinkling of the tambourine--sounding for all the world like the patter of falling rain-- accented the last, long held word  _ Home. _

For a breath, the room was deathly silent and Rose, who had not moved since Sirai had sung her first note, could only hear the pounding of her heart.

Then the room erupted in applause. Around her, patrons surged to their feet, roaring in approval while Rose sat frozen, her mind racing out the door and down the road.

Behind her, clapping loudly with his massive meaty hands, the inn-keeper audibly sniffled and blinking huge tears from his eyes.

“Well done!  _ Well done _ !” he called, snapping her thoughts back to the present. 

She looked up, and saw Sirai maneuvering toward her through a crowd of bowing young men and curtsying women, village girls tying ribbons onto the sleeves of her dress and throwing tiny little flowers.

”So,” Sirai said, smiling hesitantly down at her. “What did you think?”

_ What did she think? _

Rose’s mouth worked fruitlessly, until what came out was a garbled series of syllables.

Sirai laughed at her. “That bad?”

“No!” Rose burst out, jumping up from the table. “You gave me a brilliant idea!”

From the confused tilt of her head, it clearly wasn't the response Sirai had been expecting.

Rose grinned from ear to ear. “We don’t need her,” she said. 

“Pardon?”

Snatching up both her hands, eyes bright, Rose dragged Sirai down to sit on the bench beside her. “We don't need Snow White. What we need is  _ fairy magic _ .”

Baffled, Sirai shook her head.

“Your song, you know?” She jiggled Sirai’s hands.  _ “Sanctuary, Sanctuary calls you home _ ,” She hummed.

All at once, a spark of recognition brightened Sirai’s gaze. As Rose stared at her, Sirai’s brown eyes grew large and sparkled. A wild laugh bubbled up out of Rose’s mouth.

“We’re going to need a horse,” Sirai said.

“Maybe two.”

Two mugs of ale thumped down on the table between them. “Here you go, my dears!” cried the steel-haired serving woman, smiling at them. “A gift from that table over there.” She indicated the table across the room of fresh-faced young men, clamoring over one another to wave excitedly at the songbird of the evening.

The waitress snorted. “Cheeky,” she said rolling her eyes. “But you girls enjoy yourselves.” 

When she strolled away, Rose sourly glanced down into the glass. “We don’t have time for drinks,” she muttered.

“It would be a pity to let it go to waste.” Sirai said.

Their eyes met. Both of them grabbed their mugs, tossed back their heads, and raced each other to the bottom of their respective glasses.

They slammed their empty glasses down in unison.

“Off we go then!” Rose cried, wiping the foam from her nose with the back of her forearm.

Sirai’s doting fans watched them race up the stairs with mixed admiration and horror.

By the time they came thundering back down, Auntie Hilde in tow and Minx bouncing at their heels, another singer was on the stage, crooning out a sappy love ballad with all the sincerity of soggy bread. His delighted inebriated cohorts cheered him on.

“Where’re you off to already?” the inn-keeper cried after them. “Your night’s all paid up! That and then some!”

“We’re just leaving some things for a bit,” Rose said breathlessly. “We’ll keep the room! Just don’t clear anything out!” They were nearly out the door when Rose spun back to face him, holding the door aside with one white-knuckled hand.

“Do you happen to know where we might find some horses?”


	10. Chapter 10

**_Light,_ ** gold as honey, drifted between the branches. The air was thick with a perfume of a hundred different blooms, none of which grew anywhere but in the shade of fairy trees.

William felt an off-season chill pass through the forest, and he could have sworn he heard a frightened sigh shiver through the branches overhead. He remembered verdant colors and forever-blossoming flowers, but as Snow White slid down from her horse, the forest light seemed more grey than gold. He pulled his cloak tightly around him. 

“I remember the way,” She said, not looking at any of them. “Leave the horses.”

Snow White, her dress a dark stain against the glowing green grass, moved forward against a sea of blossoms, parting the undergrowth like the prow of a ship. Where blossoms touched the edge of her gown, they snapped closed. 

“Father,” William tried to get the Duke's attention, but he was grim-faced and silent as all the other men, his eyes rimmed in shadow.

“Here,” Snow White called to them, her pale hands pushing through the curtained branches of a weeping willow. She passed through the branches, but the lords that trailed after her like a flock of dark birds, were ensnared in them. Swords immediately left scabbards, and they hacked the branches away with gritted teeth.

A sudden gust of cold wind blew the severed branches back, revealing a clearing formed naturally in the very heart of the forest. A great white tree, branches spreading toward the sky like streaks of lighting, held dominion here, ringed by a moat of clear water. It was the same tree on Snow White’s family crest, William realized. Yes, of course. Ribbons of silver spiraled out from the pond and off into every direction, carrying the pure heart's blood of that tree to every corner of the fairy forest.

Arms outstretched as if to embrace it, Snow White walked forward. Overhead, a shower of blue birds took to the wind, shooting up between the pale tree branches and scattering across the sky. Panicked squawking and reedy cries dissipated on the air. 

“Snow!” William cried in warning, “Something's not right!”

Her black hair billowing behind her, her dress rippling in the wind, she moved forward, heedless of his warning.

“Snow!” He leaped forward, hand outstretched to pull her back from the water’s edge, and the keen blades of two swords came to rest at his throat. The terrible point of one pressed hard into his neck, threatening to break the skin. 

“What are you doing?” He hissed between his teeth. Lords Brodovan and Talisen stared at him blankly, their eyes dark as inkwells. William did not remember their eyes having been that color, nor had he remembered the moment when their armor had gone from being silver-shine, their tabards the colors of their houses, to what he saw now. 

Now, their armor was the color of dark malachite, their tabards solid black.

“What are you  _ doing?  _ Snow!  _ Snow! _ ”

Snow White stepped forward into the clear waters of the heart’s-pool, dragging her skirts behind her. From her touch spread inky black tendrils that surged beneath the water, darkening the surface in a menacing cloud.

* * *

The tree trunks were covered in blue-green moss, and fluttering atop it were tiny butterflies with iridescent wings. As Rose watched, the butterflies lifted up in a cloud and scattered, revealing their bodies to be those of tiny humanoids, barely a thimble tall.

“I think,” she said breathlessly. “That this is the right place.”

Gently, she tapped her heel into the horse’s side, urging the little sorrel mare onward. It was no good. The mare immediately turned her head to the side and snorted, shying backward until she nearly bumped into Sirai’s horse. No matter how Rose coaxed her, the mare refused to break the treeline.

Rose grumbled in exasperation. “On foot, then.”

Sirai dismounted first and Rose carefully handed Auntie Hilde down to her. Sliding her arms under Hilde’s armpits and using the horse’s side to help, she eased Hilde to the ground, straining silently under her weight. A short woman, but undeniably dense. Sirai hadn’t hefted anything so heavy since the last apple harvest.

Rose swung her leg over the horse’s flanks and hopped down. She scooped Hilde up in her arms with only the slightest grunt of effort. 

“Minx, mind the horses,” Rose said with a smirk, and the dog, true to her breed, sat down with a dutiful huff.

“ _ A sip of sweetwater will salve your pain, a single flower chase your ails away,”  _ Rose muttered the refrain over and over like a prayer, her eyes scanning the foliage as they tramped into the shadow of the trees.

Sirai, wearing only her fine green dress, rubbed her arms as goose-flesh prickled the back of her neck. “It’s colder than I thought it would be.”

“I don’t see a single damned flower,” Rose whispered. 

A soft rumble of thunder shuddered ominously across the sky. Glancing up into the boughs overhead, Rose watched as a gust of wind moved across the treetops, rippling over them in one smooth motion, like a hand passing over grass.

A single white bolt of lightning shot upward from behind the treeline directly ahead, sending veins of light spidering out across roiling clouds that had not been there only a moment before. A boom of thunder the likes of which Rose had never heard before cracked her teeth together.

If she didn’t know better, she could have sworn that the lightning bolt had some from the center of the forest.

Without a word spoken between them, Rose tightened her grip on Hilde, Sirai hitched up her skirts, and they dashed forward. 

  
  
  


The bolt of lighting cracked down, cleaving a massive chunk from the great trunk. The living wood groaned as a branch the size of a small tree sagged to the side, crashing into the water. Snow White, standing waist deep in the darkening pond, merely blinked as a shower of droplets rained down upon her.

The lords spread their stances and braced themselves as a gale rushed down upon them, tearing at their hair. William seized their moment of distraction, twisted and kicking Talisen hard in the side of the knee. With a strangled cry, Talisen dropped. William pivoted behind him, striking the sword from his hand, and when Brodovan recovered enough to stab at William, he instead struck the prone Lord Talisen just under his arm.

Whirling the stolen blade up, he parried Brodovan’s next cleaving swing but the wild power behind Brodovan’s swing as the steel clash threw William a stumbling step back.

As Talisen keeled over, still very much alive and clutching at his mortal wound, Brodovan leapt over him as though he were nothing more than a log in his path.

William's eyes darted everywhere, from Snow White’s form in the pond; to the dark shapes of the other lords turning and lurching toward him, drawing their swords; to the treeline behind him. He was badly outnumbered. Every instinct told him he should break and run like a madman. This was not like when he had taken down the Evil Queen’s men on the road, using surprise to pick them off with his bow until they were a manageable number. Any of the lords before him would be a formidable dueling opponent. All of them together would be nearly impossible.

However, his eyes strayed back to Snow White form. 

He couldn’t leave her.

He’d been forced to do that as a child, when she’d been taken as the Evil Queen’s captive.

But he wouldn’t do that now.  _ Not this time. _

Pulling his own sword from its sheath, William struck a fighting stance.

Then a whirlwind of blades descended upon him.

William dove to the side, catching one of the lords off guard. He tripped him and came up onto his feet just as a sword hacked down upon him. Crossing the two swords overhead, he caught the attacker’s sword with his own blades and looked up into his father’s face.

There was no recognition in Duke Hammond’s features. His expression was hauntingly blank and his eyes were two spots of gleaming black from which two lines of black tears ran.

What had  _ happened _ to him?

“Father!” William cried, trembling against the pressure leveled down at him. “Father! Stop this!”

The Duke twisted his blade away, pulling loose. William thought that perhaps he’d gotten through to him.

Then the Duke’s boot hit him in the chest.

  
  
  


Rose skidded to a halt as the dense forest abruptly gave way to meadow. A white tree stood at its center, smoldering from a soothy stain that ran down one side. This was where the lightning had struck and now, this was where a skirmish was taking place.

Soldiers in armor so dark green it looked black were harrying a single armed man. As Rose and Sirai ducked back behind a tree, trying to stay out of sight, the outnumbered man took a boot to the chest and went sprawling. The sound of his breath being knocked out of him in a rush could be heard even where they crouched.

Rose lowered Hilde’s unconscious form into the protective shadow of the tree, craning around to see what was going on.

“Who’s fighting out here?” she muttered.

Peering over her shoulder, Sirai's eyes suddenly grew round with horror. Sirai grabbed Rose with both hands, shaking her. 

“What, what, what?” Rose hissed, twisted around to face her.

Sirai pointed emphatically. “That’s the king!” 

“What in the nine-hells is going on?” Rose said, in a perfect imitation of her aunt’s favorite epithet. 

“And you thought this would be easy.” Auntie Hilde’s voice was weak and phlegmy, and when Rose looked at her, she saw grey, heavy lids. Dark veins spiderwebbed up the side of her neck and onto her left cheek. “Don’t you know, my lass, that life is a bear hunt?” She laughed, which turned into a shudder and cough. Rose helped her sit up a little straighter against the side of the tree.

“Are we gonna go help him or sit here fawning over me?”

Rose snorted. “We?”

“I’m not dead yet,” she said, thrusting her hand out, pinching her fingers open and closed. “Some of those potions might help get me on my feet.”

Sirai shot Rose a glance and she shrugged helplessly.  _ Might as well, right? _

Sirai shrugged the medicine satchel off her shoulder and flipped it open. She drew one out and handed it to Hilde. Hilde popped the cork off with her teeth and spit it out, guzzling it down in two quick swallows. She thrust her hand in the satchel and grabbed another two in her hands. “Hey!” Sirai chastised her.

“Oh, what’s the harm?” Hilde snorted. “I’m probably going to die anyway.

Rose drew the short sword at her hip and palmed it in her left hand.

Hilde cleared her throat as if she’d just drunk a mug of ice cool lager. “No spear?”

“No, left it at the in,” Rose muttered. “I didn’t plan on needing it.”

“Lot’s of plans are going amiss this season. Alright, so what are our weapons.”

Sirai held up two large vials in either hand. “Sleeping draughts and rubbing alcohol.”

Hilde gave a thick laugh. “Haha, rubbing alcohol. Right in the eyes! That’ll set up straight. Where are my powders?”

“Here,” Rose said, pulling off the bandolier and handing it to her. Then she drew her hunting knife. “Ready?” she asked.

Sirai and Hilde nodded. 

With a collective roar, they launched into the fray.

Rose charged in swinging high with her sword while Hilde dodged low, skidding on her thigh across the grass. She sliced her blade across the back of the first man’s ankles and he went down. Hopping over him, Sirai cranked her arm back and lobbed a vial into the next man’s chest. It shattered against his chest plate, right under his neck, and clear liquid dotted with tiny chips of glass doused his face. Screaming, he covered his eyes, dropping his sword, and fell to his knees. 

A third assailant lunged at Sirai, coming in at her from the side, and Rose dove to intercept him. The blade that crashed against hers felt like it had been swung by an ogre, and a bolt of pain shot clean up her arm into her shoulder. Clenching her teeth against her cry of pain, she spun out of his grip, and let that unuttered cry build behind her teeth. It carried through into the swing of her hunting knife. She struck him backhand. The pommel slammed into his temple. The resulting crunch let her know she’d possibly broken his jaw. Then Sirai leapt forward and shoved the opened bottle of sleep draught between his lips. He hit the ground like a falling tree, Sirai still laying on top of him with the liquid spilling out of his mouth.

Rose flung out her hand and Sirai caught hold of it, allowing the red-head to toss her up onto her feet. Planting her own feet, Rose flipped the short sword around in her hand, checking the strength in her wrist, and turned to face their next 3 attackers.

Auntie Hilde stared them down, cackled like a madwoman. As one stepped in to stab her, she threw a glittering cloud of glass dust. The nearest man caught the cloud full in the face. Flailing blindly, he swung his sword on his own cohorts, so that all three were forced to break off and battle one another, two against one. 

That left the king and the four men he now struggled alone to fend off.

  
  
  


The wind knocked out of him, William rolled up onto his hands and knees, reaching wildly around for his weapons. The stolen sword had been knocked clear, but William grabbed his own, and held it out before him weakly, in a vain attempt to hold him off. 

“Father,” William cried hoarsely, laboring to breathe through the stitch in his ribs. “Come to your senses!” 

Still, there was no sign of recognition on his father’s face. 

It was then that Lord Reinholden stepped in and chopped his sword down upon William’s head.

William knew he couldn’t stop the blow from striking true.

Then his father, Duke Hammond , pivoted and caught the downward blade with his own. With a grunt, he planted his back leg and locked hilts with Reinholden.

For a moment, the two men stood shoulder to shoulder, their bodies bent as they sought to wrench the other man’s blade from his grasp. 

Then a screaming that sounded uncannily like the cry of bog banshees filled the clearing.

Three women stormed into the clearing. In a whirlwind of blades and fists and shattered glass, they cut through the council of lords. William didn’t know who they were, but he decided he liked them well enough.

“I’ve got Reinholden,” cried his father over his shoulder, still locked in combat against the lord of the Troll Fens. “Rescue the queen!”

William got his feet under him and turned to see Snow White standing in the dark pond watching the melee with a blank expression on her face. He stepped forward, reaching for her, and a white tree root whipped up out of the ground and struck him across the face.

  
  


For a moment, the king was airborne. Flecks of blood flew from his broken nose.

Sirai cried out in alarm but then there was no time for Rose to think. Tree roots the color of bone ripped up from the soil all around them, lashing like whips. Rose struck hard, cleaving one in half as Auntie Hilde leapt out of the way of one that swiped at her head. Rose swung and struck and swung again as roots darted at her like the heads of venomous snakes.

Across from them, where the king was, the two older men still battled against one another among the waving white tendrils, but the roots didn't seem to know friend from foe. One of the warriors was grabbed about the head, and as Rose watched, slammed hard into the ground at the water’s edge. 

“Rose!” 

She turned to see Sirai, her green dress smudged with dirt and a white root wrapped around her ankle, being dragged toward the water.

With a cry, Rose leapt forward, ready to cut her free. Then she was struck in the side.

She spun and fell, hitting the ground with such force that her ears rang. For a long moment, she lay on the grass, the world a blur of pain. Overhead, flickers of white lightning spidered over the clouds and thunder rumbled again. But it felt distant. The pain in her shoulder felt distant, too, as did the faded cries of someone calling her name?

_ Sirai?  _

_ “ _ The queen!  _ The queen!” _

A man’s voice, calling over and over again.

The medallion laid in the hollow of her throat, and when she swallowed, it moved.

_ I'm not some special prophesied one, destined to save everyone. I’m the ugly red-headed bastard daughter of a tavern wench. I’m an orphan, raised by a dwarven bear-hunter. I’ve never had a home or a family. _

She remembered her auburn haired mother, brushing her hair.

She remembered Auntie Hilde, pinching her cheek, playing got-your-nose.

She remembered Minx as a puppy, running circles around her.

Of Sirai--the most beautiful woman she had ever met- looking her in the eyes with that tender smile and saying, _ “I never thought of you as ugly, Rose.”  _

Her eyelids grew heavy. She let them flutter closed.

A soft whimper distracted her.

Her eyes fluttered open to find Minx staring down at her. Gently, the dog huffed in her hair--breath warm, nose cool--and licked at the place where blood was dripping down her temple and into her ear.

“You were supposed to stay with the horses,” she whispered, barely recognizing her own voice.

Minx’s ears turned this way and that. She whimpered.

“Alright, alright.”

Rose clenched her hands around the hilts of her weapons. Slowly, painfully, she dragged herself upright until she was sitting, staring numbly at the luminous, terrible visage of Snow White.

  
  
  


Blood dripped from his nose, pouring down over his lips. As William dove into the black water, fighting toward her, the blood was washed from his face

He called to her, reaching for her. 

Her eyes were black and expressionless as his father’s had been. 

She raised one hand up out of the water, and as she spread her fingers, the roots that threatened him moved as well.

She was not in danger from them. She was controlling them.

“Snow!”

He screamed her name with all of his strength, hoping that this time she would hear him. This time, he wanted to be the one who broke the spell. He’d broken the one over his father. He could save Snow White this time.

Then he remembered Snow White lying on the bier, in her death gown, motionless. He remembered kissing her mouth in grief. But that hadn’t awakened her.

It hadn’t been him then. He wouldn’t be the one to wake her now.

She struck him, and he was flung back against the shore, to lay motionless there; sword still in hand and legs still in the water.

  
  


With a battle cry, Rose launched herself into the pool, blades flying as she hacked at the terrible white limbs. Every hack came with a scream. When two of the roots tore the blade from her hand and snapped it in half, she slogged onward with only her hunting knife. 

She just had to get close enough, just close enough to--

A root smashed into her left hand. The hunting knife flew into the air. 

The queen, in her red and black down, took a step back.

Roaring, Rose leapt on her.

Her right hand closed on the raven black hair. Her bleeding left hand grabbed at the sleeve of the queen’s gown. With all the strength she could muster, she shoved queen Snow White’s head under the water and held her there.

Hands like claws scratched at her, tangling in the medallion’s cord. 

The roots of the tree whipped wildly around in the air like a marionette severed from its strings. 

Beneath the bubbling surface of the water, Snow White’s pale face glared up at her. Rose stared back, her teeth bared in a snarl. Slowly, slowly, the expression relaxed from the queen’s face. Slowly, slowly, the hands that clawed at Rose went slack. Rose’s own expression loosened until it mirrored the staring face beneath the water: a reflection of her own features in a dark mirror.


	11. Chapter 11

**_Rose_ ** lifted Snow White in her arms and slogged back toward the shore, the sodden garments of the queen’s skirts dragging behind her. As she carried her, the black threading that covered the Queen’s gown bled off into the water until all that was left was the deathly still queen, lying in a plain red dress.

She collapsed onto the grass and laid the queen’s water-logged form down beside her. Already, the pale skin felt cold. 

Whimpering, Minx sidled up to her and tugged on Rose’s sleeve.

Snow White _ had _ to live.

Rose pushed herself up onto her knees and planted her hands firmly over Snow White’s heart. Pumping at her chest, Rose began to push the water from the queen’s lungs. For a moment nothing happened, so Rose threw all her strength into it, her own heartbeat thundering in her ears.

_ She has to live _

“You have to live.”

_ She must heal them all. She’s the white witch, the queen, the prophesied one. _

Tears stung Rose’s eyes.

_ She has to wake up.  _

“Wake up!”

A great gout of clear water spew up from Snow White perfect lips. She jerked upright, hacking water, then sank back down against the ground. Her dark lashes fought their way open and she looked at Rose with brows creased in confusion.

“Who are you?” Queen Snow White whispered. 

Her eyes fell on the medallion hanging from Rose’s neck. Gingerly, the queen reached up and cupped it in her hand.

“My name is Rose,”  she said. “My mother’s name was Myra. My father was King Magnus. I’m your younger sister.”

A hand fell gently on her shoulder from behind. Rose twisted around defensively, but it was only Sirai staring down at her, her hair scarf gone and her dress soaked. She sank down on her knees beside Rose, and Rose crushed her in a warm embrace. They drew appart, and Sirai cupped her face in both her hands: small, calloused from work, but so welcome and strong.

“Where’s my aunt?” Rose asked.

Minx alerted them with a bark of alarm.

Weaponless, Rose immediately clenched her first to fight. Sirai turned around, her eyes fierce, but it was only the bruised and battered king, supported by an older man with steel grey hair.

“Snow…” 

“Your majesty.”

The queen gazed at King William and Duke Hammond in mute horror

“You have no idea what’s happened, do you?” Rose asked.

The dark waters around Snow White’s hem began to bubble and write.

“Watch out-!” William called out, and four pairs of hands dragged the queen back from the water’s edge. 

As they watched a long, black shape coalesced in the water, solidifying in the center of the pool, stretching from where Snow White had laid on the shore.

A shadow reared up out of the water like the hood of a giant poisonous snake, and great black wings made of darkness unfurled upward, stark against the white limbs of the great tree. 

“ _ This was my chance to begin anew, _ ” a sibilant voice whispered from the shadow. “ _ Here at the heart of all things, I could remake everything, even myself, and rule not  _ loathed _ by all but _ loved  _ by all _ .”

Two glittering eyes appeared in the darkness, and a beautiful, terrible face, looking as if it was carved out of pure obsidian. 

“ _ Do not fight me, _ ” she said.  _ “Live only to adore me, and I will love you with all my heart. _ ”

“You have no heart,” Sirai whispered, recognizing the Evil Queen’s terrible visage.

“I could never have come here by myself, but she carried me here-- _ Snow White _ . I said I would have your heart, one way or another.”

“You will not have her,” A man’s voice said firmly. Lord Reinholden carefully stepped forward, pointing his sword at the shadow apparition. His voice and his grip trembled, and blood ran from his brow down the side of his face, but his eyes were clear. “You will not take Snow White the way you took Magnus. I will not allow it!”

A terrible laugh trembled across the surface of the water, a sound that was a cackling of a hundred ravens.

“You cannot stop me! None of you can.My roots go deep, my hands brush the sky! I am everywhere!” 

“Ravenna,” Snow White climbed to her feet with Rose and Sirai’s help. “Whatever you intended, it’s finished. You’ve failed.”

“Foolish girl! I am eternal! When your knife struck my heart, you gave me more power than you could ever imagine!” 

“You said it yourself,” Snow White said softly. “You could never have come here by yourself. Sanctuary itself would have fought you. The only reason you are here, right now, is because you came here with me. But now, _ I cannot protect you _ .”

Again, that cruel laugh.

“Protect  _ me _ ? You insolent girl! You--” The terrible, booming voice faulted as the great black wings of shadow began to hiss and dissipate on the air like morning mist. Ravenna’s darkened visage glanced upward, over the branches of the trees, and overhead the clouds were breaking. Gold sunshine poured down upon her. The waters caught the reflection of light and glowed.

The shadow let out a furious scream, twisting in on itself. 

For a moment, a human shape was almost visible, draped in black cloth, arms up to shield herself from the light, as ribbons of darkness steamed away from her. Then the shadow collapsed.

Screeching, a single raven, the color of melted gold winged away, directly into Snow White hands. It tried valiantly to escape, its gold wings battering at Snow White’s implacable grasp. At last, the raven went still.

Snow White cradled the gold bird between her hands, gazing at it solemnly. The gold spread across its feathers shrunk, receding upward until only its eyes were gold--its feathers soft and white. Then the gold winked out from the raven’s eyes, revealing only a very mortal blue.

“You’re home,” Snow White said to the white raven. 

It cooed quietly as she unfolded her hands from around it, and released the white raven into the sky. I flapped upward, coming to rest in the great branches of the heart tree. The tree’s limbs were now intact, unscorched and undamaged. The waters ran clear. The meadow was suddenly in full bloom, fragrant flowers gently bobbing as glittering butterflies took to the wing. A gentle melody permeated the air

Minx barked and tore off across the field, chasing fairies as the once-fallen lords of Snow White’s kingdom staggered to their feet. They no longer wore the dark malachite armor, and though their hands searched for the wounds they’d be given in the fight, there was no proof that any of them had been harmed. Lords Talisen, Brodovan and all the rest looked around them in baffled wonder, like sleepers awakened from a dream.

Sitting up among a bed of flowers, Auntie Hilde shook petals from her hair with a powerful sneeze. Coming to her senses, she quickly thrust back the sleeve of her shirt and unwrapped the gauze from around her forearm. The white strips of cloth floated away on the wind. Beneath them, Hilde’s skin was unmarked. 

She glanced up, just in time to see the great tree spring forth with a multitude of apple-red leaves, and in the bright bows a white raven called and fluttered its wings. Lord Reinholden lowered his sword and went down on one knee. William, his nose mended, exchanged a meaningful glance with Snow White.

Pink petals scattered on the air, raining down on them.

With the warm breeze burnishing her hair, Rose held Sirai’s hand in her own and marveled at it.

  
  
  
  


**The End**

**Author's Note:**

> "Snow White and Rose Red" is my unofficial sequel to "Snow White and the Huntsman" and "The Huntsman: Winter's War". Universal Pictures, feel free to hire me lol


End file.
